


Finding a Way Forward

by TheMuchTooMerryMaiden



Series: Finding a Way [2]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Depression, Established Relationship, Homophobia, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Recovery, mention of past (very slight) abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-16
Updated: 2014-05-01
Packaged: 2017-12-05 11:27:53
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 14
Words: 56,019
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/722765
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheMuchTooMerryMaiden/pseuds/TheMuchTooMerryMaiden
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This is a sequel to <a href="http://archiveofourown.org/works/379318/chapters/619665">Finding a Way Back</a> and may not make a huge amount of sense without reading that.  However, for those of you who want a 'new readers':</p><p>Greg and Mycroft have been together for about a year and a few weeks ago Greg was the victim of a drug-assisted gang rape.  Mycroft reacted badly, thinking that Greg had been with someone consensually.  <em>Finding a Way Back</em> dealt with the immediate aftermath of the rape and Mycroft and Greg's first steps towards finding a way back to where they were.  In the end they both realised that they wanted to fight for their relationship.  And now, new readers, read on!</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

With a complaint made by an unconnected member of the public, two unconnected members of the public, Deb corrected herself, she could justify the application of some man power to Greg’s case which meant that here she was briefing some of her team, late on a Thursday evening before they went out to ask questions and damn the overtime.

“So we’re looking for anyone who might have seen the victim talking to one or more blokes around the middle of March this year. We have a photograph of the victim and only descriptions of the perpetrators.” She paused, taking a deep breath before she continued, “Some of you know why this case is important to me, to us, if you can track down anyone matching the descriptions who might have been seen sharing a drink with Greg Lestrade then that would be particularly important, I don’t have to tell you why. This is a close knit community you’re going into, there are rumours going round, see if you can get anyone to tell you them. We are almost sure that we know at least one of the perpetrators but if at all possible we need a link to a different offence. Most of us have had dealings with DI Lestrade over the years let’s see what we can do to sort this out.

 

After that weekend the two of them had stayed at Greg’s flat for the whole of the following week, but in the end Mycroft needed more of his stuff than could sensibly be achieved by sending Anthea on errands. Greg had got back late from work that evening, finding Mycroft and a meal waiting and by 9.30 they had only just finished eating. Mycroft cleared his throat,

“I’m going to have to go back to my flat this weekend,” Mycroft began, “I’m sor…”

Greg interrupted,

“You don’t have to be sorry, you daft sod, it’s been great having you here this week but obviously you need to get back to your own place.” The smile he gave Mycroft with this, despite its very slight tremulousness, warmed him and encouraged him to say what was on his mind,

“You could come with me?” Mycroft’s intonation made it a question but rather than answer it Greg got up to clear away the plates and cutlery, his face closing down in a way that might have been comical in another situation. Mycroft forced himself to wait a moment, fought down the instinctive apologies that sprang to his lips, and took a deep breath before speaking again, another question, “Too soon?”

Greg continued to stack the plates and walked over to the dishwasher before he finally spoke with his back to Mycroft,

“It’s not a matter of too soon. I want to be with you but ... I don’t think I can…” his voice petered out and he busied himself with putting things into the machine, placing things with far more care than Mycroft has ever seen him take before. Mycroft continued to wait, not wanting to force Greg to answer his question but increasingly aware that just waiting was doing precisely that. Eventually Greg finished, pushed the door shut and turned to face Mycroft, “I’m sorry, but I don’t think I can go back to your flat, not right now anyway. As soon as I go in all I can think about is that morning.”

Mycroft tried hard to keep his face impassive while he desperately tried to work out what to say or do . Greg dropped his eyes, seemingly contemplating a single spot on the floor tiles and responded to Mycroft’s silence by attempting to explain, “It’s the first bit of this whole thing that I have a clear memory of, anything before is just a haze, like single images, me walking, the cab driver who finally stopped, but I remember what happened when I got to your flat.” He quickly glanced back up to Mycroft and then away again, “I’m sorry, I know I ought to be able to get past it, I’m sure I will be able to, but I can’t right now. Sorry.”

Mycroft swallowed, turning slightly as he ran a hand distractedly through his hair; he knew there was going to be an annoying wobble to his voice when he spoke, but as it was Greg spoke again before he had the opportunity, “I meant what I said, what you did wasn’t that bad, and I want us to be together, but I need not to think about that morning too much, it’s not because of what you said, what you did, I genuinely think it’s because it feels like that’s where it all started.”

Greg’s speech startled a reply from Mycroft,

“Where it started?”

It wasn’t often that Mycroft failed to understand what someone said, it was a disconcerting feeling at best. He watched as Greg looked back down at the floor before he replied,

“Where everything unravelled, where the world turned out not to be how I thought it was, where everything went to shit,” he paused and Mycroft could see that he was about to apologise again and he stuttered out the first thing that came to mind,

“Please don’t,”

“Pardon?”

“Please don’t apologise again, you have nothing to apologise for, nothing at all.”

Greg shrugged, darting a glance up at Mycroft,

“Seems to me that I do. If nothing else I was particularly stupid that night and then I let you think what you thought and never even tried to explain,” he looked up at Mycroft again, “You’re a reasonable bloke, if I’d have tried to explain you’d have listened even angry as you were.” There was a long pause which Mycroft knew he should be filling with some sort of reassurance but no answer was the right answer, before Greg continued, “I hate that that’s made us both so miserable and I hate that you’re being forced to deal with all this crap.” He took a deep breath and then continued, “I hate how not simple everything is now.”

Mycroft felt a smile unexpectedly form on his face and saw it answered more tremulously on Greg’s face,

“Yes,” Mycroft said, “it’s hard to realise that we thought things were complicated back then, isn’t it.”

“You don’t know what you’ve got till it’s gone,” Greg agreed, singing the line from the song.

Panic gripped Mycroft for a second, it hadn’t been a week since Greg had reassured him that they would find their way back, and he found that he couldn’t meet Greg’s eyes and instead stared fixedly at the sink next to him,

“It has gone, hasn’t it?” he asked. He cleared his suddenly tight throat but yet again Greg spoke before he could continue,

“Yes it has, but that doesn’t mean that we can’t build something new does it?”

“I hope not.” Mycroft had wanted to say more but everything that it occurred to him to say seemed either ridiculously inadequate or worse like he was making assumptions when he had no right to expect Greg to tolerate him on even a social basis. In the end he blurted out the thing that he least wanted to say, the thing that sounded even to his own ears like a blatant plea for reassurance when he should be the one doing the reassuring,

“Why are you not angry with me? It’s the least I deserve.”

Mycroft watched as the slightly dazed expression on Greg’s face began to change to confusion, before he spoke again, 

“I mean it. You say that what I did wasn’t that bad compared to the rest of it, but it was, it was by far the worst thing.” Greg began to speak but Mycroft spoke over his attempt, “You had the worst experience and you came to me assuming that I would make everything better, that I would look after you, and instead of that you got anger and rejection. You should hate me. And yet you don’t and more than that you are letting me back into your life.” There was a long pause before Mycroft continued to speak, “I don’t deserve you,”

Greg interrupted,

“If you’d done it on purpose, then I suppose you’d be right, but you didn’t, neither of us did. You keep telling me that it’s none of it my fault; it’s time you realised that none of it was your fault either.” Greg sighed and then continued looking squarely into Mycroft’s eyes, “I suppose if I let myself dwell on it all I could work up a head of steam, get really good and angry at you, pick an argument, have the full on, plate-hurling, row. And then when I’d done that, when we’d done that, where would I be that was any different than before, except with less crockery? It would all still have happened, I’d still feel the same, you’d still feel the same, nothing would change.” He took a deep breath, “As far as I’m concerned we belong together, I’ve never been so happy, so at peace as I have been this last year, I want that back. I know I can’t have it right away, I know there’s a long way to go, but those bastards shouldn’t take that away from us,” he paused and then took a deep breath before he continued, “I hope you feel the same .”

Mycroft knew that he wouldn’t have the words, instead he crossed the kitchen in two impatient steps and pulled Greg into his arms and with only a momentary startle Greg relaxed into his embrace. They held each other like that for long minutes and Mycroft lost himself in the scent of Greg, in the feeling of his strong arms before he stirred to look at him as Greg looked up. It seemed the most natural thing in the world for Mycroft to lean down ever so slightly and kiss Greg. It felt like coming home and Mycroft could tell that Greg was also relishing the feeling, at least at the start, but very quickly Greg gently pushed him away before again tucking his arms around Mycroft’s waist and leaning into him again. Mycroft held him, mentally cursing himself for snatching at what he wanted but determined that Greg would not pick up on the thoughts. He turned his head slightly so that it was resting more squarely on Greg’s head. He repeated his question from earlier,

“Too soon?”

Greg tightened his grip before he replied,

“No, just too risky .”

It took Mycroft a moment to work out what Greg meant by that and when he did, he in turn tightened his grip on Greg but otherwise he didn’t reply, knowing that if he said what he genuinely thought they might very well end up having a proper argument. It was Greg who spoke again,

“Let’s go to bed,” he said quietly and Mycroft recognised the tone of voice from a previous life and felt himself twitch at the thought before hurriedly thinking of something else. That couldn’t have been what Greg was thinking he told himself.

However, when they both got as far as the bedroom it turned out that was exactly what Greg was thinking. Greg went into the bathroom first and when Mycroft got into bed Greg turned to face him and wrapped one arm around his chest as he ducked down and placed a gentle, closed lipped kiss on Mycroft’s nipple, it made Mycroft jerk his head back into the pillows unexpected as it was. His reaction drew a throaty chuckle from Greg whose hand drifted further down under the waistband of the pyjama bottoms Mycroft was wearing until his finger-tips were gently plucking at the hair at the base of his cock. Mycroft exercised iron self control and spoke,

“You don’t have to do this, you know...” he stifled a moan as Greg gently cupped his steadily hardening cock, tantalising him with a touch that was feather light.

“I want to,” Greg replied, and with that he gripped far more firmly and began to stroke Mycroft from root to tip.

Mycroft lost himself in the sensation for a moment or two, it had been so long or at least it seemed so long. He reached between them, meaning to return the favour, only to feel all of Greg’s muscles tense up,

“What’s the matter?” he asked, gently, sure that the frustration and the fear he was feeling were not audible in his voice, “Is it ... did you ... remember something?”

“No it’s not that, I just don’t want you to,” he began to run his fingers along Mycroft’s cock again, but they could both tell straight away that it wasn’t going to get them anywhere. Mycroft broke the silence hating that he could hear the nerves in his own voice and that Greg would hear them also and perhaps feel pressured to do something he didn’t want to,

“Why do you not want me to?” he asked, considering it a small victory that he hadn’t stopped one word earlier.

Greg rolled over and away from Mycroft, ending up as close to curled up in a ball as a grown man could easily manage and after a moment’s thought Mycroft turned over as well, fitting himself to Greg’s curved back with one arm reaching round Greg and his face nuzzled into his hair, “Can you tell me what’s the matter,” he asked quietly, dreading the answer.

Greg tucked himself up even tighter so that when he replied his voice was muffled,

“It’s the one thing my mother was right about, I can’t,” in the quietness Mycroft could hear Greg swallow, “I won’t risk you catching anything from me; that I couldn’t live with.”

“Oh,” Mycroft breathed the word at the same time as his arm tightened around Greg’s hunched form and he mentally flailed for an answer. “You know...”

“Yes, I know,” Greg interrupted, “I know the statistics, I know ... I know, but ... I still won’t take that chance with you, you’re too important and you’re too important to me.”

Mycroft leaned forward and gently kissed the back of Greg’s neck and felt him fractionally relax,

“There are such things as condoms, you know,” he murmured,

“Yeah, but they have been known to split,” Greg straightened out slightly and even though he was lying in bed Mycroft could extrapolate the change and knew that if Greg had been standing he would have been in his ‘determined’ stance, “not that there’s any reason for you to miss out,” he continued before he turned and his hand began to stray back towards Mycroft’s cock. Mycroft caught his hand and brought it up t his mouth, kissing Greg’s knuckles before lacing their fingers together.

“No,” he said, “I find I would rather wait.”

Greg sighed,

“Thanks, but it’s going to be months and ...even then ... it may not be good news you know.” He swallowed and Mycroft found himself suddenly nervous, with a shrewd guess as to what Greg was going to say next. “I know I said that we could make something new but really you’d be better off finding someone else. I wouldn’t blame you, you know.”

“I don’t know about blame,” Mycroft replied trying to keep his voice steady, trying to be sure that Greg would not hear the panic building in him, “I think I’d want sectioning if I chose to let you go.” Even in the darkness Mycroft could make out Greg’s answering smile, and he raised their linked hands to his mouth to kiss Greg’s knuckles again. “Have you been worrying about the tests?” Mycroft wondered as he asked the question whether Greg would try and bluff but he didn’t,

“Yes, well, a bit anyway. I mean it’s not the death sentence it used to be, I know, but,” he paused but then continued in a forcedly brighter voice, “It’d be a bit annoying having spent all these years being careful, wouldn’t it?”

Mycroft knew a temptation to join Greg in making light of the situation but he couldn’t bring himself to, he’d too often felt hot and cold from the worry about the results and more than that he was sure that Greg wouldn’t really want him to.

“When do you go in for the first test?” Mycroft asked even though he knew the answer.

“Wednesday,” Greg replied instantly and that told a tale all of its own.

“May I accompany you?”

Greg snuggled into him just a little before he replied, 

“I was hoping you’d ask.”

“Thank you for allowing...”

“Don’t do that, I’m not letting you, I’m just really glad that you’ll be there.”

Greg stopped speaking and the silence stretched out and Mycroft found himself getting more and more tense, sure that Greg was going to tell him that they shouldn’t be together, but finally words seemed to pour out of Greg,

“What if it’s positive, My? I can’t kid myself that this was the first time they’d done what they did, they could have anything, hep C, syphilis, anything, I should go I could already have given you bloody anything the way I keep crying over you.”

Greg moved to sit up, to get up and get out of bed but Mycroft held on to his hand,

“Please don’t go. I don’t want you to sit worrying about this on your own, you’ve clearly been doing too much of that already. Even if the tests come back positive we will deal with that, there’s nothing we can’t deal with together.” Mycroft could predict with a strong degree of certainty what Greg was going to say next and he wanted to head it off, “If you’re going to tell me that I’d be better off without you, that you’re too complicated, that you’re too broken, then please don’t. I won’t leave you to deal with this on your own anymore, Greg. I realised last weekend that that was what I had done, that I’d let my guilt stop me from helping you in the way that I should have done. It’s not a mistake that I will be making again, I intend to stop making you suffer for my manifold stupidities.”

Gently but firmly Greg extricated himself from Mycroft’s hold and sat up, pulling his knees up until he could wrap his arms around them,

“You know that’s one of the problems with having a conversation with you or your brother, it’s like that chess thing where someone announces ‘check in seven moves’, you can work out my part of any conversation, makes it bloody difficult to say what I need to say.”

“I’m sorry, but it ... pains me to hear you put yourself down.”

“It’s not like that, really it’s not. I’m broken and the last thing you need is to spend your time trying to put me back together. I love you, I’m pretty sure I’ll always love you but ... it’s all so difficult. You should find someone else, someone who can support you, not someone that you constantly have to prop up.”

Mycroft thought for a moment before he replied,

“I don’t see it as me propping you up, or the other way round really. I see us as more like, I don’t know, say a medieval cathedral, where the weight of the building makes the buttresses strong enough to support the building, or like vaulting or an archway where each individual stone would fall left to itself, but together they are strong enough to support the whole structure.”

“Seriously?” Mycroft could hear the scepticism in Greg’s voice and swore to himself that he wouldn’t rest until it was no longer there,

“Seriously. I don’t think you have any clear idea of how on the edge I was when I met you. I don’t think I did, come to that. Oh, I would have continued in the same way but I was in danger of losing my ... hackneyed phrase ... moral compass. I was beginning to make what I realise were questionable decisions. You made me, you make me want to be a better person. Now, we both need to sleep.”

It took some time until Mycroft felt Greg relax into sleep and far, far longer for him to manage sleep himself, not in fact until he had formulated a plan as to what to do next.

 

As if they’d actually agreed it both Greg and Mycroft took their time over their breakfast the next morning, Mycroft was going ‘home’ that morning and neither of them was exactly keen on hurrying that moment forward. Eventually, though, Mycroft began to pack up at least some of his stuff, being careful also to leave things. They’d never really spent a lot of time here it had been more a case of Greg moving more of his stuff into Mycroft’s flat than the other way round. Mycroft therefore found it difficult to work out what to take with him and what to leave and what made it worse was that Greg who appeared to have woken in a better frame of mind seemed to be finding the whole thing quietly humorous. Eventually Greg took pity on him as he dithered over a bottle of shampoo. Greg reached round him as he stood in front of the wash-hand basin and took the bottle from his hand,

“You’re welcome back any time, you know, don’t need an invite, rather you were here than you weren’t. The only downside is that you’ll probably have to double up on things like this.”

Mycroft returned his smile as he turned to face Greg,

“However will I bear the expense?” he asked as he took the bottle back out of Greg’s hands before putting it back down and pulling Greg towards him and kissing him gently on the forehead. “Thank you, dear-heart. I don’t imagine I will stay away for long, but there are just a few things I need to do at home. May I ring you?”

“Of course you can, I’m working Sunday and I’ve booked the whole day off on Wednesday,” he looked down before leaning slightly more into Mycroft and resting his forehead on Mycroft’s shoulder, “not really sure why, bit daft really. More likely to need the time when I get the results.”

“What time is the appointment?”

“Ten-thirty, over at UCH.”

“I’ll pick you up at 9:45?”

Greg hesitated,

“Will it be you picking me up or will it be, you know, one of your cars?”

“Just me, love,” Mycroft replied,

“Thanks.” Greg murmured and Mycroft tightened his grip on him as they stood there. Mycroft wanted to say reassuring things, he wanted to tell Greg that everything would be all right, he wanted to take away the fear, but more than that he didn’t want to lie to Greg, so instead he just held him.

 

Mycroft’s last meeting on Tuesday dragged. It would have dragged whatever else was happening he was aware of this but tonight it dragged even more. It was ten-thirty by the time he was free to make a phone call and he found himself hesitating to make that call, for fear that Greg had actually managed to get to sleep and he was going to wake him up and then be leaving him to stare at the ceiling until morning. In the end he decided to let it ring twice and then if Greg were asleep it probably wouldn’t wake him and if he were awake he could call back. When Greg didn’t return the call Mycroft tried to be glad that he was getting some sleep.

The text message came through just as Mycroft was getting into his car:  
Sorry, I was in the shower, everything OK? Would have rung but I never know when you’re in a meeting. What can I do for you? – GL

Mycroft had wondered why Greg had texted instead of ringing and the explanation that he didn’t know whether Mycroft was in a meeting didn’t quite ring true given that he had rung Greg in the first place. Still, if for whatever reason Greg didn’t want to speak, Mycroft would respect his wishes. He keyed a response:

I was just wondering if you were OK, and I wanted to confirm the arrangements for tomorrow. Is 9:45 still OK? – MH

Greg’s response came back quickly

Yes, 9.45, I’ll be waiting – GL

It did not escape Mycroft’s attention that Greg had not responded to his other question and he knew that Greg would know that, so after a moment’s thought he asked again:

I’ll be there. Are you OK? – MH

A message alert chimed almost the instant that Mycroft had sent his own text, so quickly that he knew that it couldn’t be a response to that question. He opened the message:

I’m not OK – GL

Mycroft’s answer was quickly sent:

I’m coming over – MH

But even so, Greg had sent another message slightly before he could press send:

Can you come over? – GL

Mycroft didn’t waste any more time and requested that his driver should make the journey as quickly as possible, so that within fifteen minutes he was at Greg’s building. When he got out of the car he made straight for the building before stopping short and turning to the driver,

“You can go for the evening; I won’t need the car in the morning either. Anthea will let you know when I need the car again.”

He paused while the car drew away and then turned directly into the building. He decided to take the stairs and very soon he was outside Greg’s door. He paused. He could let himself in or he could knock at the door, each choice having its own set of upside and downside. After he’d stood there frozen for a minute he realised what a stupid thing it was to be dithering over such a simple thing and reached for his keys in his pocket and opening the door. 

Greg called out on the instant that he had the door open,

“That you, Mycroft?”

Mycroft could hear the tension in Greg’s voice, could sense Greg schooling himself into immobility, overriding his desire to check who was coming into his flat. Mycroft answered quickly,

“Yes, I’m just taking my coat off.”

“I’m in the living room.”

Greg was stood by the window when Mycroft walked into the room, Mycroft thought that he’d probably been peering round the curtains before he’d arrived; every line of him showed the tension he was feeling.

“I won’t ask you how you’re feeling,” Mycroft began,

“No, I guess it’s pretty obvious,” Greg replied, trying a smile but not really succeeding, “can I make you a brew?”

“Tea would be lovely,” Mycroft said, putting his briefcase down and taking off his jacket before reaching to loosen his tie. As he looked over he saw that Greg had turned back to the window and was peering down at the street in front of the block; it was clear to Mycroft that the offer of a drink had been an automatic response. He draped his jacket over the back of the sofa and went into the kitchen to fill the kettle and make tea. When he brought the mugs back into the main room, he put them down on the coffee table and walked over to Greg who was still standing at the window,

“Come on, love, come and drink your tea,” he said quietly.

“Oh, sorry,” Greg replied coming back to himself with an attempt at a rueful smile, “should have been me making the drinks.”

“Nonsense,” Mycroft replied, “that would only be the case if I were a guest. Come and sit down and tell me what is troubling you.”

Mycroft waited until Greg had sat down before purposely sitting close to Greg but not so close he hoped that Greg would feel hemmed in by him and raised an eyebrow in an invitation to Greg to reduce the distance between them if he wanted to; the sigh from Greg as he leaned into Mycroft was both a reward and a confirmation that he had read the situation correctly.

Mycroft would have been content to hold Greg like that for the whole night but he also thought that Greg might want to talk about what was bothering him and so eventually he spoke,

“Do you want to talk about it?” he asked quietly.

“There’s nothing to talk about really,” Greg muttered,

“So it’s just tomorrow that’s bothering you?” Mycroft asked,

“Mostly tomorrow,” Greg replied and from the increase in tension Mycroft could feel in his body perhaps encouraging him to talk about it wasn’t the best idea he’d ever had, “I suppose I’m bound to be a bit worried, aren’t I?”

“Yes, but it’s not just that, is it?” Mycroft asked,

“No not completely, or...” Greg stopped speaking and sat forward, shrugging off Mycroft’s arm, ending up sat forward, elbows on his knees, head in his hands. Mycroft waited as patiently as he could for Greg to continue, watching him, seeing the tension in his muscles increase, but eventually he had to speak,

“We don’t need to talk about it now, I know it’s difficult. What you really need is to relax.” Greg looked round at him and Mycroft could see at a glance that the conversation was going to degenerate into an argument if he wasn’t careful, “No, no, I know it’s not that easy,” he said, “but I have an idea.” With that he got up and went over to the stereo, putting on the radio and retuning, then he put on the television but turned the noise right down before walking back to the sofa and to Greg’s bemused expression.

“You know,” Mycroft continued, “almost the only flaw I’ve ever found in you is your lack of appreciation for Cricket, this is a perfect opportunity for you to finally get to grips with it! The Ashes!” Mycroft settled back down onto the sofa so that Greg was between him and the television and he could see Greg’s incredulous expression. With a grin he continued, “Is something amiss?” He was pleased to see an answering smile trying to get away from Greg,

“Where do I even start?” Greg asked, “The radio and the television?”

“The perfect way to watch the cricket is to have the Test Match Special commentary and the television pictures. Even physics conspires to give the perfect experience. The commentary comes in a couple of seconds before the pictures, so you have time to look up if something exciting happens!”

“I think that’s precisely my point, if something exciting happens.” But despite his comment Greg was already turning so that he could lean back against Mycroft who in turn twisted so that Greg could settle between his legs leaning against his chest.

“You see the problem is,” Mycroft replied as he turned up the volume on the radio, “that no-one has properly initiated you into the mysteries of the English Game.”

Greg turned slightly to be able to see Mycroft’s face,

“So that’s what you’re going to do is it? Initiate me? ‘S been a while since that happened.”

“It will be my very great pleasure,” Mycroft replied with an unmistakeable leer which made Greg giggle in a way that Mycroft hadn’t heard since everything had gone wrong. “Any way, hush while I tell you the basics before they start.”

And slowly as Tuffers and Vaughn and Boycott talked about England’s prospects and the green and white images flickered Mycroft felt Greg relax against him. He was perhaps the most relaxed that Mycroft had known him to be since the attack. It occurred to Mycroft at about 1:30 that perhaps he ought to wake Greg and get them both to bed but in the end he decided that they were better where they were and that he would have put up with far more than a cricked neck for the sake of Greg not spending this night awake and worrying and struggling to sleep and with that thought he slightly tightened his grip on Greg and drifted off to sleep.

 

Of course the downside to going to sleep to Test Match Special, Mycroft thought, was that you woke up to an incessant repetition of a promo for Five Live Sports Extra, that and an incredibly stiff neck. Still he thought as he looked down at the gently snoring Greg, well worth it. A glance at the stereo told him the time; he had at least half an hour before he needed to disturb Greg, half an hour where he could indulge what was rapidly becoming his favourite hobby, watching Greg Lestrade. He allowed himself a small smile, even just over the course of the last ten days and with the worry of today Greg had lost some of the shadows and gained back a little weight and Mycroft mused that he should have listened to his instincts sooner when they had told him not to leave Greg on his own. But I can’t change the past, he thought, I have to make sure that I get things right now. And that included waking Greg and getting him to his appointment.

 

The test itself was of course anti-climactic. Mycroft couldn’t really blame Greg for getting wound up about it, he’d got wound up about it himself and both of them had known that the real issue would be the tests coming back. It was all over in a matter of minutes, a quick blood sample and ‘call back tomorrow morning for the results, keep taking the drugs’ and it was over. Neither of them spoke until they were outside, where Greg broke the silence,

“Feel a bit stupid, now,” he said rubbing at his face and not quite meeting Mycroft’s eyes, “wonder if I should go back to work,”

“I have another suggestion,” Mycroft replied as they moved towards the car.

“Yeah?” Greg asked.

Mycroft took a deep breath and spoke again,

“We could go and look at some flats?” He hadn’t meant it to come out like a question, but faced with saying it now, that’s how the sentence formed itself,

“What?” Greg said, looking a little confused,

“We could go and look at some flats, I mean, you don’t feel comfortable in my flat and that means I most definitely need somewhere else to live.” Mycroft took a deep breath and continued, attempting to sound less like a seventeen year old with a crush, “What I meant to say was: I am going to move I would like it very much if you would agree to our getting a flat together but even if you aren’t ready for that I would value your opinion.” 

For once Mycroft couldn’t work out what the expression on Greg’s face was, he was aware of what seemed like centuries passing before Greg finally responded,

“You want us to move in together?”

“Only if you want to...” Mycroft began and then caught himself before he could sound any more stupid, forcing himself to quietness, forcing himself to wait.

“Wow,” Greg muttered, “this is all a bit sudden, I don’t really know what to say.”

Mycroft waited for a few moments more, trying to keep a tight grip on his emotions, trying to take what Greg had said at face value, he was satisfied by the level tone he managed to keep to when he finally did speak,

“Why don’t we go for a coffee while you think?” he asked, gesturing down the street to a coffee shop that in the normal run of events he wouldn’t even have countenanced using.

“Yeah,” Greg replied, but Mycroft could tell that he wasn’t really listening.

 

The business of ordering coffee took them a few minutes, minutes that Mycroft judged Greg needed, he certainly took a long time to order for a man who more than nine times in ten ordered the same thing. He was, Mycroft knew, using it all to distance himself, and that thought made Mycroft himself feel faintly sick. He felt sicker still when they were sat down and Greg spoke,

“It’s not that I don’t want to…”

Mycroft interrupted,

“Stop, please don’t,” he paused and swallowed, trying to retain his composure, adjusting his expression to an approximation of a smile, “please don’t try and let me down gently, I would hate that.” What he was going to say next faltered on his lips as he saw an expression of annoyance flicker over Greg’s face before he spoke,

“And I hate it when you interrupt me, and yet…”

Mycroft knew that Greg had paused to give him the opportunity to speak but he also knew that it would be a bad move. He nodded instead, indicating that Greg should continue, that he was sorry,

“…like I was saying it’s not that I don’t want to, I do. Last week was wonderful, but,” he paused and Mycroft tried not to try and work out what he was going to say, “I can’t be … I won’t be a ‘kept man’, this has to be something we go into as an equal partnership and I’m worried that keeping things down to that level might cramp your style a little.” It was said with a smile but a nervous smile Mycroft noted as he puzzled for a moment as to how to answer in a way that would not come across as patronising,

“Is that really something that worries you?” Mycroft asked as much as anything to give himself thinking time, “It’s not even slightly how I see things, you do know that’s not how I see you at all, don’t you?”

Greg looked down, apparently minutely studying his coffee,

“Sometimes. Sometimes I know that, other times, I feel like such a ...” He stopped speaking and Mycroft was firmly determined to wait, to give him the space to say what he needed to say. Greg cleared his throat and looked up, meeting Mycroft’s eyes fully, “One of the weird things about this whole experience has been the fact that I keep ending up feeling like some sort of bloody damsel in distress. I suppose in the past when I’d dealt with rape cases, it didn’t occur to me how … emasculating the whole thing is, and every time someone has to rescue me I feel like there’s even less chance that I’ll get back to being me .” Greg looked down again, back to his apparently fascinating coffee, “When you came and found me in the restaurant, well I can’t explain, I was so bloody grateful, so bloody amazingly relieved that it was you and somewhere under that all I was so angry. Not at you, or not just at you, at me, at the situation and at those bastards for leaving me in that state. So I have to take things back, I have to be me, I can’t be an adjunct to you and I know you didn’t intend it like that,” he continued with one swift glance up at Mycroft before his attention returned to his coffee, “and I’m sorry, but I can’t do that.”

Greg picked up his coffee and swigged down a good half of it leaving part of Mycroft’s brain reflecting on the fact that it was a good thing that the coffee in these places was always lukewarm, while the rest of him tried to find the right thing to say. As Greg put the cup down he reached slightly across the small table and gently cupped his hand around Greg’s hand, not holding, just one gentle stroke,

“Thank you for telling me that, I should have realised that was how this would feel.” He paused, trying and failing to work out how Greg was going to respond to what he was going to say next, “You said this was sudden,” he began and Greg looked up at him a question in his expression, “me suggesting we should get a place, but, you see, I don’t think it would have been sudden if you hadn’t been attacked, I think it would have happened about now anyway. You were barely using your flat, I know I certainly hated the nights you spent away; before last week I can’t remember the time I slept properly. I know things are different now, but if we are going to make a commitment to ... us ... what better way than this? I don’t want to seem to be pressuring you and I wouldn’t if I didn’t think that you would be happier; I know I would.” Mycroft allowed himself a small smile, “It’s not like sticking to your budget would mean that we were living in a bed-sit is it?”

“Are you sure?” Greg asked and Mycroft hoped that he wasn’t imagining the lightening of Greg’s expression,

“Very sure.” Mycroft confirmed with a smile, reaching to the small case he’d been carrying and pulling out the sheaf of estate agent’s particulars he’d come armed with, his smile broadening as Greg leaned further forward to look at the first of them.


	2. Chapter 2

None of the flats that they looked at that morning and early afternoon had been quite what they were looking for. 

“We’re going to be hard to suit, aren’t we,” Greg said when they were walking away from the last of them, “it’s the fact that we’re looking for two flats really that makes it doubly difficult. I suppose we could look at a new build, that way there’d almost certainly be somewhere for your security to set up camp.”

“I’m not sure that I’d want to live somewhere just built,” Mycroft replied, “one of the things I’ve always loved about London is the history of the place, but you’re right it probably makes it more likely we’ll find somewhere.”

Mycroft glanced sideways at Greg when he got no response to what he said, to find him looking down and away, clearly puzzling about something. Mycroft chose not to disturb him and they walked on a little way in silence, heading back towards Greg’s flat albeit by a circuitous route. Eventually Greg spoke,

“Who pays for your security?” he asked. 

Mycroft didn’t know what he’d been expecting but this certainly wasn’t it and for a second he merely stared at Greg, before he assembled the answer,

“It’s a departmental budget head,” he replied simply, but it was clear from Greg’s expression that his answer wasn’t enough and clearer still when Greg spoke again,

“Yeah, I guessed so, but, I suppose what I mean is why you do have so much security?”

Mycroft wasn’t at all sure he wanted to answer this question and certainly not right now, but it was Greg asking so he did,

“Well, for a long time I didn’t see the need of it myself, but I have, I represent, I suppose, a lot of information and after I had this pointed out to me I saw the need for a permanent security detail and that’s what I have now.”

“Had it pointed out to you?” Greg asked. 

Mycroft sighed,

“I couldn’t persuade you not to ask about this now, could I?” Mycroft asked.

“Of course,” Greg replied, “it’s probably a case of ‘I could tell you but then I’d have to kill you’ isn’t it.” 

His tone was light, but a far less sensitive person than Mycroft could have heard the gentle undercurrent of hurt.

“Not really, besides what exactly do you imagine your security clearance is?”

Mycroft couldn’t help the grin at the change in Greg’s expression as he fully realised what Mycroft had meant.

“Really?” he finally asked,

“Of course really. Seriously Greg, you don’t think people would have insisted on having you checked out?”

“I suppose so, now you mention it, just hadn’t thought about it.” He stopped speaking as they continued on their way, but it was obvious to Mycroft that now that he was thinking about it he was rapidly catching up. Greg stopped and turned to face him, “You checked me out when I started working with Sherlock, didn’t you?”

Mycroft couldn’t quite work out what the expression on Greg’s face was, but his answer would have been the same anyway,

“I’ve been trying to protect Sherlock with more or less success since I was seven, so yes, when a new person came into his life and made as big an impression as you did, yes, I made sure you would be ... a good influence on him.”

“Not sure I’ve ever been called a good influence before,” Greg replied before turning and continuing on towards his flat. 

Again, Mycroft couldn’t quite work out what Greg was thinking and settled for walking beside him, waiting for him to speak or for them to arrive at the flat. After a few more yards Greg spoke again,

“What would have happened if the security checks had turned something up?”

“I was really hoping that you wouldn’t ask that question,” Mycroft replied, “it would of course have depended on what had turned up.”

“Oh, I don’t know, let’s say I’d spent some time working as a rent boy?”

Mycroft’s mind reeled back at that thought, at the thought of people using Greg, of him being treated as disposable, of the fact that that was exactly what had happened back in that alley way. Mycroft knew that he had a good ‘poker face’ but it seemed that Greg at least could read him quite easily,

“Sorry, My, don’t look like that, I’m sorry I should have thought. Forget I said anything.” With that he reached out to grasp Mycroft’s unresisting hand and squeezed it, “Let’s get back home. Do you have to go back to yours tonight?”

“No, I was intending not to if that would be OK?” Mycroft hated the question but couldn’t seem not to ask it,

“I’d rather you were here, you know that,” and he turned to carry on walking still holding Mycroft’s hand.

 

When they got back to the flat the two of them prepared a meal. Mycroft loved the seamless way they could do that, equally at home in either kitchen. When he thought of the fact that soon they would be in their kitchen he found himself grinning. Greg noticed and he turned to face Mycroft with a smile of his own,

“What’s making you so happy?” he asked.

“What, you mean apart from you?” Mycroft replied seeing a faint blush wash over Greg’s face, “You’ll think it’s stupid but I was enjoying the way we work together and thinking how it would get better when we’re in our kitchen.” The blush was distinctly noticeable now and Greg directed his gaze to the floor. Mycroft stepped forward and gently lifted Greg’s chin with one crooked finger before he equally gently kissed him. It was a sweet kiss and they lingered over it before Greg gently pulled back,

“We’re never going to eat at this rate,” he whispered.

“I’m not sure I can bring myself to care,” Mycroft replied leaning forward to kiss Greg again, feeling Greg’s arms folding around him for a few moments before Greg gently pushed him away.

“We need to eat,” Greg smiled, “and you said you were enjoying the cooking.”

Mycroft stepped back and went back to his preparations,

“I was,” he muttered, “but not as much as I was enjoying the kissing.”

Greg grinned as he turned to stir the sauce.

 

Mycroft was aware of a sense of well-being that he hadn’t had since Greg had been attacked as he cleared away after their supper. These domestic moments were really the thing that he’d never thought he’d have, he’d certainly never had them with Graham. The meal had been good, delicious even and they had chatted about inconsequential, domestic things and for the first time they had both managed to be relaxed through the meal, but as Mycroft made coffee he could sense the tension building. Greg couldn’t settle sitting first on the sofa and then in the armchair and then standing by the window before moving back to the sofa and starting the sequence again. Mycroft watched as Greg clearly steeled himself to remain still, and instead began to worry at a finger nail.

In what now seemed like a previous life, Mycroft would have made an ‘improper suggestion’ as his grandmother would have termed it, and the two of them could have creatively worked off their tension, but he doubted that was an option after their conversation last week; Greg was hardly likely to feel better about it with the results of the first test due tomorrow. And then, Mycroft thought, there’s another two months to wait, and even then after what happened he may just not want to. It was an uncomfortable thought, but one that he had to deal with, how would their relationship change if Greg never wanted sex again? The one thing that Mycroft was sure of was that he would not let sex become a thing that Greg did for him. He paused, drying his hands and taking what he considered to be an unfeasible amount of time to formulate a plan as to how to help Greg through this evening and hopefully allow him to get some decent sleep. But finally an idea came to him and he raised his voice,

“Have you ever played golf?” he asked as he walked back into the living room.

“I beg your pardon?” Greg replied, as he looked up with clear confusion on his face,

“I said, do you play golf?”

Greg’s incomprehension was still clear on his face and he swallowed twice before he answered,

“Had a go when I was little, but, no.” He paused, “Why? Do you?”

To his shock, Mycroft could feel himself beginning to blush and he busied himself with his cuffs while he answered,

“I’ve been known to play the occasional round,” he paused and then braced himself to look squarely at Greg, “it is rather expected of one.”

Greg positively grinned, and Mycroft took a moment to enjoy both the grin and the fact that here was the one and only man in the world whose teasing he could stand.

“You must have loved that,” Greg said and what had been a grin could probably now be best described as a smirk, “are you any good?”

“It rather depends on whom I am playing.”

“Ah, so it’s just another tool in your armoury of world domination!” he paused for a second, “You play just better than the people you want to dominate and just worse than the ones you need on side?”

“Something like that,” Mycroft said.

“You’re really that good?”

“Not really it’s more that most of them are that bad, having been pushed into golf by wives who are either that ambitious or that glad to see them out of the house. What about you?”

Greg’s expression clouded a little,

“Like I said I played a few rounds. With my dad,” he smiled, “My mum was, as if you could doubt it, the ambitious end of your choices. He took me a few times, but honestly all the fiddling little rules of the club drove me mad. The bar was just conversation after conversation about who had signed a guest in too many times last Michaelmas Thursday. The game I quite enjoyed.” 

“That’s good,” Mycroft replied, “put some casual clothes on, I’ve got us booked into a driving range at 8.30,”

“What?” Greg asked again,

“I’ve booked us a session on a driving range in Harrow.” Mycroft sighed before standing up straighter and squarely addressing Greg, “Look we’re both like cats on hot bricks, if we don’t do something this evening we’ll end up arguing and neither of us need it, this way we can work off some of our tension and have a little more chance of sleeping tonight.”

“It’s a good point,” Greg replied getting up, “I’ll be with you in five minutes, that is I will be if I don’t have to dress up?”

“No, it’s not that kind of place, I doubt that they even know when Michaelmas is!”

 

Despite how dubious he was Greg seemed to be having a good time. Mycroft couldn’t quite work out whether Greg had down-played his previous experience or was a very quick study. Any rustiness seemed to drop away almost as soon as he started knocking the balls into the middle of next week. What he was quite sure of was that the physical exercise suited Greg. More than once he found himself lost in admiration of Greg’s trim torso as it twisted with his swing when he drove ball after ball into the distance in the end he had to stop looking aware of the fact that keeping watching Greg was not going to calm him down in anyway. Mycroft felt that his own attempts were laughable in comparison.

Greg was a natural athlete and Mycroft considered himself to be a natural civil servant. Of course, over the years he’d had training, he’d insisted on it, and on an intellectual level Mycroft knew that he had skills, but on an emotional level he still thought of himself as the stupid fat boy he’d been at school when confronted with any kind of sporting activity and he found himself wondering what it was that Greg could possibly see in him.

As far as Greg was concerned, by the time they’d knocked a couple of hundred balls into the middle of next week, Mycroft could tell that he had made a good choice, he’d heard Greg genuinely laugh more in that hour and a half than he had in the previous month and a half. The sky had darkened as they had worked their way through the bucket of balls and now, in the deep twilight with the sky fading from the lights on the horizon up to the few visible stars everything was crystal clear. Greg had offered him the club for the last few balls but he’d declined, still enjoying the long, lean line of Greg as he twisted with each swing rather more than he would have enjoyed hitting them himself.

When Greg had watched the last of the balls disappear into the twilight he turned to Mycroft with a grin on his face,

“That was a brilliant idea, My.”

“Well as you know, I’m full of brilliant ideas,” Mycroft replied with a smile that reflected Greg’s own, “we should do this more often, do you think?”

“Yeah,” Greg said slotting the club back into the holder on the side of the bucket and reaching for his jacket, “so much more entertaining than actually playing golf, golf with the boring bits taken out. Next time though, you’re going to do more of the whacking and _I’m_ going to enjoy the view!”

Mycroft felt himself blush but he didn’t allow his gaze to drop,

“You noticed that, then?”

“Oh, yes I noticed,” Greg replied, still advancing until he could pull Mycroft towards him, hands running down to his behind and pulling him even closer as he leaned up to kiss him. It was like their first kiss, Greg taking what he wanted, and this time Mycroft allowed himself to completely melt into Greg’s embrace. After a moment Greg stopped, kissing resting his head on Mycroft’s shoulder instead as he increased the pressure of his hands, “Yeah, next time _I_ get to stare at _this_ while you put in all hard work.” Mycroft could hear the smile in Greg’s voice and could feel the relaxation in his frame. Greg gently pushed him away, “But right now we have to get home for the cricket! I simply have to know if England can hang on for six hours to get a draw, what wouldn’t be exciting about that?”

 

The next morning the first lightening of the sky woke Mycroft and his first thought was what if it’s positive, and with the sudden rush of adrenaline he sat up and looked across at Greg to find him already awake and looking back, the same question clearly plastered across his face.

Mycroft spoke, quietly and gently with the emphasis on the first word,

“We will get through this, whatever the results are, you know that don’t you?” 

Greg closed his eyes tightly and Mycroft could see faintly in the early morning light the fringe of moisture on his eyelashes. Mycroft could not have helped pulling Greg into his arms if his life had depended on it, but after a moment Greg pushed him away slightly,

“I couldn’t ask that of you, for you to stick with me, you’d...”

Mycroft interrupted,

“And yet you couldn’t get me away from you with a crowbar. We’re in this together, my heart; I will always be here with you. I don’t want, will never want anyone else.”

Greg leaned back into him and Mycroft held him trying to convey all that he was thinking and feeling through the way he held Greg, feeling him relax slightly, hoping that he would feel him relax back into sleep, however unlikely that was.

They lay like that until the sun was fully up and Greg began to stir,

“No use putting it off,” he muttered and Mycroft released him carefully, “do you want the first shower?”

 

Mycroft had to be the first to leave but he found it incredibly difficult to actually make that move and instead he found himself standing by the door, fidgeting with things making minute adjustments to his tie, lining up the seam on the handle of his umbrella with the seam on the thumb of his gloves, aware that Greg was watching him with amusement.

“I’ll text you,” Greg said, “you know, when I get the results.”

“Do you have to go in person?” Mycroft asked,

“I think that will depend on the results. I suppose if I ring and get told they need to see me then I’ll have a pretty good idea.” Greg was clearly trying for a smile but in Mycroft’s opinion he wasn’t quite carrying it off and the idea of Greg making that call turned Mycroft’s stomach.

“I can rearrange things at work,” Mycroft began, phone already in his hands to contact Anthea,

“No, don’t, I keep telling myself that this is no big deal, and we keep saying that it’ll be OK whatever the results, and part of that is that I have to deal with it. Like I said, I’ll text you with the results, but it could be anytime, so don’t worry if you don’t hear anything, it’ll just be that I’ve got caught up with work.”

“Very well, if you’re sure.” Mycroft replied, conscious of a sinking feeling at the thought of leaving Greg but knowing that he should let Greg deal with it if that’s what he wanted.

“Yeah, I’m sure,” Greg said before moving towards Mycroft and giving him a quick peck on the cheek, “Thanks for yesterday, that was a good day.”

To Mycroft’s ears that sounded far too retrospective, like it might be the last ‘good day’ but he couldn’t find a way to say ‘we’ll have more good days’, without sounding falsely reassuring, so instead he leaned forward and kissed Greg,

“I’ll be waiting for your text.”

 

Mycroft never had any trouble focusing on the work in hand but on that morning even he was just slightly distracted. By midday Mycroft was more than aware of his nerves and it was taking all he had not to snap at his people, even though objectively he knew that they were their usual impeccably efficient selves. By two he’d sent everyone away and was pacing his office, phone in hand putting off second by second ringing Greg, knowing that he shouldn’t but wanting more than anything to speak to him. When the text came in at 2:14 it startled him so much that he ended up almost juggling with the phone in an attempt not to drop it. It read:

> So far, so good, bit worried for a while, tell you about it later. Love you.

It wasn’t until his legs buckled slightly that Mycroft realised how worried he’d been.

 

Adrian knew he could have stood down, knew perhaps that he should have stood down. DI Reedley had told them that she had enough now to ensure that she could properly investigate, that she could now access the manpower she needed, but something, something in the way his boss had looked in that meeting meant that Adrian for one would continue to watch, continue to try and find the people who had put that fleeting look in Mycroft Holmes’ eyes. And that evening he rather thought that he had.

The man, Adrian thought of him as ‘The Target’, was nondescript in a way that could only have come from a determined effort. There was nothing about him that you could pin to in any way at all, brown hair, short but not aggressively so, t-shirt and a leather jacket, worn but not scruffy jeans no-brand trainers, nondescript, yet Adrian was nearly sure he had his man. The Target was sat at the bar, working his way through a pint of lager, largely keeping his eyes to himself but if Adrian was any judge, and he was, almost his entire attention was focused on the bloke next to him who was anything but nondescript. Again it was subtle, but subtle in a way that Adrian had learned to spot in his youth, a way that The Target had also learned to spot. So that all he had to do now was to wait and hope that he left his drink while he went to the loo or was otherwise distracted. Then Adrian would move. 

Adrian worried about that bit. If he moved too soon then The Target could always say it was meant for a bit of fun, it was illegal to add something to someone’s drink, but Adrian was sure that his boss would want to go for the more serious crime if he could so Adrian would wait and see what happened, trying to be sure that the mark was kept safe and also that The Target was let in for the maximum charges. The timing was everything and if Adrian hadn’t trained himself out of tells to the best of his ability, he might have resorted to the chewing of his thumbnail which had told his parents that he was puzzling something out all through his childhood.

The second bloke stood up, gestured to one of the bar staff that he’d have another pint and headed in the direction of the loo. Adrian almost applauded when he saw the skill with which The Target added the liquid to the new pint as soon as the staff member had turned away, a quick tilt so that the stuff didn’t sit in the head and the drug was in there, two seconds and The Target was taking another pull of his own pint. In another two minutes the prospective victim was back and taking a swig of his doctored pint.

Adrian bided his time as did The Target. When the other bloke was about a third of his way through his pint The Target spoke to him. Adrian was at the wrong angle to make out the words, it seemed to be about the sport that was currently showing on television screens behind the bar; whatever it was he said was clearly either funny or the drug made it seem so, because the man laughed and continued the conversation, gradually leaning more and more towards The Target until it was clear that they were whispering.

When The Target got up to go, the man stood up as well. The Target directed his attention back to his glass, clearly telling him to drink up and Adrian was impressed with that little piece of attention to detail. It was time he acted. Going towards the bar he swiped the man’s glass out of his hand at the same time speaking directly to the bar staff,

“Call the police, will you, he’s spiked this guy’s drink.”

“What?” the barman asked reaching for the glass, “Listen, mate we don’t want any trouble...” but there was no way that Adrian was losing that piece of evidence just because the owner didn’t want any trouble. Things happened rapidly after that. As he spoke the victim swayed and sat down at the same time The Target made a bid for freedom. Adrian stamped on his foot letting the man’s momentum carry him to the floor. With speed Adrian rolled him onto his front and held his arm behind him,

“Call the police,” Adrian repeated, emphasising each word as The Target futilely struggled and locked eyes with the barman until he reached under the bar and came back with a phone.


	3. Chapter 3

Adrian had training for this kind of thing, training for interrogations that would obviously be far worse than he was going to experience as a ‘have-a-go-hero’ who stopped someone getting their drink spiked for obviously nefarious reasons. It didn’t seem to help. He was as nervous as hell for so many reasons, nervous to the point where when the door to the small interview room opened he startled badly in a way that would have made his instructors weep.

Adrian had been expecting DI Reedley, what he got was a thin slightly sallow bloke with a dissatisfied look on his face, well dissatisfied until he noticed how badly Adrian had been startled, after that his expression could more accurately be described as a smirk. 

“Oh, sorry, didn’t mean to make you jump!” he said, with the smirk widening to a smile but still with an air of condescension, “I’m DS Swindlehurst, I’m here to take your statement.” 

“Oh, right,” Adrian said, deciding to play into the idea that he was very nervous about the interview, it had been after all one approach he’d considered when trying to decide in what persona to present his information, after all with anything like a bit of luck he would need to keep up this persona for some time, on and off, “What do you want to know?”

Swindlehurst didn’t answer and instead sat down making an inordinate amount of fuss about setting out an official looking writing pad and a pen and to Adrian’s surprise getting a pair of sealed cassette tapes out of his pocket,

“Just a minute,” Adrian began but the DS talked over him,

“I’ll be recording your statement, and making a written copy which you’ll need to sign,”

“Is that usual?” Adrian managed to squeeze in the question before Swindlehurst carried on speaking and judging by his expression he wasn’t happy about being interrupted,

“Increasingly, especially in difficult cases,”

Adrian interrupted again,

“How is this a difficult case?”

“Well, as I was going to say before you interrupted, sir,” Adrian noted both the tone of voice that accompanied the ‘sir’ and the pause, “cases like this are always difficult, never entirely sure whether someone has given consent or not...”

“Whether someone consented to having their drink spiked?” Adrian couldn’t have kept the incredulity out of his voice if he’d been paid for it, “What would that possibly be about?”

“Well, these people, it might have just been a bit of a game that went wrong when you noticed,”

“These people?” Adrian asked even though he knew what the DS meant and knew that it wouldn’t do any good,

“It’s a known homosexual pick-up joint,” Adrian knew what the next question would be, “actually, sir, what were you doing in that particular establishment?”

 

Mycroft found it quite ridiculously difficult to bide himself in patience to hear what had happened. Greg’s cryptic ‘bit worried for a while’ left him knowing that he should wait and let Greg tell his story while knowing that just finding out was a possibility. In the end he have himself a mental shake and forced his attention back to an almost randomly chosen work task and the minutes ticked by until six.

It never took long for Mycroft to get home (there had to be some perks to his job) and his leaving time was calculated carefully to give him time to get to Greg’s flat, shower and change and get supper started before Greg arrived home.

Mycroft was tasting the rich pasta sauce he was concocting when his phone chimed. Putting the spoon back into the saucepan he picked it up to read the message:

I’ll be late, sorry. Will you be at mine when I finish?

Mycroft sighed and then hit reply:

Of course I will. I’ll have food to warm for you when you get in. Take care.

Mycroft deliberately finished the sauce and poured it into a container and put it in the fridge for later and then looked about himself for something to do while he waited for an undisclosed amount of time for Greg to get home. He had brought no physical work home, his intent for this evening had not been to work but there were still a number of things that required his attention and as he settled back into the sofa cushions he resolutely turned his attention to them. It was a measure of the strain he had recently been under that an hour later he was no further forward, his mind repeatedly wandering, turning in recent but already well worn and highly useless paths that could all be summed up in the simple three word declarative sentence: I failed him. No matter how many times Mycroft told himself that to keep thinking that same thought helped nothing and no one he couldn’t seem to help it. 

It was in some respects getting better at work, the first few days he had been a wreck and eventually Anthea had come to speak to him about it.

When she walked into his office, a thing she did probably a dozen times a day he had known that something was amiss and for a second his mind had jumped directly to Greg but a second’s pause allowed him to work out that this was work, that Anthea was here as a representative, that this was, horrible American phrase, ‘An Intervention’. He took a deep breath,

“Yes?”

Anthea yet again confirmed his good sense in hiring her by neither pretending nor prevaricating,

“We’re worried about you, you’re not yourself, what can we do to help?”

Mycroft was surprised to find that he was angry at the statement and about the question,

“Am I not entitled to some degree of distraction?” he asked, keeping his voice level but aware of the fact that he would by no means kept his anger from Anthea’s notice. She stood up straighter before she replied,

“Of course you are,” she began, “but you know that your position is such that distraction could have extreme consequences. If you need to take time then take it, sir. Divide up some of the work so that you only need to focus on the things that only you can do,” she paused and Mycroft knew that she was reaching the meat of the issue, “talk to someone, sir, we can find someone discrete...”

“You think?” Mycroft asked, and he knew that his anger was clearly showing, “Who could I possibly ‘talk to’ without compromising my position here? Perhaps I should ring the Samaritans? I can’t imagine how that could possibly be a problem if anyone found out!”

“You could talk to me!”

It was the first time Mycroft had ever heard Anthea so much as raise her voice and the shock of it brought him up short as it had no doubt been intended to. “There are many of us here who owe you, many times over, let us repay a little, sir. I can listen and you certainly need to talk. I can’t offer solutions but I can listen.”

Mycroft let himself slump for a moment before he looked back to her,

“You are right of course. Sit down.”

They had talked for a long time that afternoon and evening and while the discussion resolved nothing he did undoubtedly feel better and in particular much more clear-headed.

“Thank you, my dear,” he began, but she interrupted,

“Don’t thank me, sir; just remember that we are all here. For instance there are any number of our people who would want to assist with any investigation.” 

Mycroft held up a restraining hand,

“I had already thought of that but Greg has made his opinion clear, that things must be handled by the police,”

“I can understand that but still you need to remember we will help if you need us,”

“I will remember that.”

And of course he had, bringing some help in when it seemed that the investigation had stalled, despite being aware that Greg would be incandescent when he found out and from time to time he still talked to Anthea.

His phone chimed again and he picked it up expecting it to be Greg giving him an update. The caller ID told a different story. Mycroft sat up properly his mind sorting through the current operations trying to work out what might have gone wrong, what might require his direct intervention in a field operation and coming up blank,

“Adrian?”

“Sorry to disturb you, sir,”

Mycroft could hear the worry in the younger man’s voice,

“What has happened?”

There was a pause and then Adrian spoke again, quickly,

“I think I may have regularly stuffed things up, sir.”

Mycroft, now knowing without a doubt what the call was about, repeated his question,

“What has happened?”

“I carried on, you know watching the area we talked about, and, I know you told us to stand down but I knew it was important to you and so I carried on.” He paused again and Mycroft could hear him swallow and then take a deep breath before he continued with a forced calm, “I think I found one of the men. At the very least I found a man spiking someone’s drink.”

“Did you report it?”

“I more than reported it, the guy was just about to leave with him, so I had to stop him and of course that ended up with the police being called.”

“I assume that you gave no indication that you were anything other than an observant bystander.”

“No, but, the detective I ended up speaking to was more than a little negative. You know the type, ‘these people’ and aspersions cast...”

“Not to worry, Adrian,” Mycroft replied his mind rapidly turning over what this would mean, “I’m afraid I’m not terribly surprised. You did what you had to do and hopefully this will begin to push the investigation forward. From the sound of things you did well this evening, thank you.”

Mycroft rang off and began seriously to try and work out what his best course of action was, unable at least in the short-term to see his way forward.

 

It was gone eleven when Greg quietly let himself into the flat. Mycroft could tell that he was trying to be quiet, and that he was expecting that Mycroft would have taken himself off to bed by now, Mycroft called out to save him the trouble,

“What time do you call this?”

It was an old joke between them, they’d seen it once as the opening line on a saucy seaside postcard on a weekend trip to Brighton and Mycroft knew that unless Greg had had a completely wretched day it would have made him smile to hear it, and indeed Greg was still smiling as he came into the room,

“I call it time you were in bed,” he replied with a grin that quickly turned into a yawn, “sorry it’s so late, you shouldn’t have stayed up, you’ll be knackered tomorrow.”

“So will you. Do you want something to eat or is it too late?”

“No, I’ll just turn in I think, what about you?”

“I’ll be along in a moment; I’ll just get you some water.”

“Thanks, love,” Greg replied through another yawn and then he turned and headed towards the bedroom.

Mycroft was aware of a feeling of relief that he had an excuse not to broach the subject of the investigation this evening as he straightened the room up and went into the kitchen to pour Greg a glass of water. It would all of it keep until the morning, he had that much more time to work out what he was going to say and how he was going to say it.

Even tired as he was, Mycroft knew that Greg would struggle to sleep without at least a little ‘winding down’ time. When he got to the bedroom, Greg was kicking off his shoes and ever so slightly losing his balance as he did so. Mycroft reached out a hand to steady him and hurriedly put down the glass of water on the bedside cabinet,

“You really must be tired,” he commented and he shifted his hand up pushing Greg’s suit jacket off his shoulders. It left the two of them chest to chest and after a moment’s hesitation Mycroft let the jacket fall to the floor and pulled Greg into his arms. Greg nodded and Mycroft suppressed a chuckle as Greg rested rather more of his weight on him than he normally did. Eventually however he stood up, yawning again and continued to undress,

“I didn’t sleep any too well last night, either,” but before he could speak further Mycroft asked,

“So what did you mean by ‘bit worried for a while’?”

For a second or two Greg looked at him nonplussed, before in his tired state he apparently realised what Mycroft was talking about,

“Oh, that, sorry, everything’s OK so far apparently, no virus found,” he paused rubbing at his face, “or at least if there is any it’s at so low a level that it’s undetectable.” Greg continued to get undressed but Mycroft stood back as if to watch him and was surprised to find that Greg’s apparent desire to face the worst even when it hadn’t happened irritated him; he covered the feeling replying lightly,

“Well, that’s excellent news, but really ‘bit worried for a while’, what happened?”

Greg sat down to remove his sock and yawned again before he spoke,

“Yeah, you know where I said, I suppose I’ll know if I ring and they ask me to come in? Well they did, ask me to come in, I mean, but it turned out that it was part of a new initiative.”

The sudden rush of adrenaline that Mycroft felt at the thought of Greg being asked to come into the clinic left him feeling slightly weak-kneed,

“A new initiative?” he asked, a little proud of keeping his voice steady when he said it, proud also of not asking ‘why didn’t you call me?’

“Yeah, apparently a lot of people getting a ‘clear’ on the first test are less than conscientious about continuing the anti-virals, so now they are asking everybody back so that they can emphasise to them the need to continue.”

Mycroft thought for a moment,

“Hence the ‘at so low a level that it’s udetectable’?”

Greg looked confused for a second and then realisation dawned,

“Yeah, that’s what they said and I suppose it’s meant to keep people on the ‘straight and narrow’ if you’ll pardon the expression, but you know I’m not sure it’s a good strategy, feel like it might make a person feel like there was no hope, you know?”

Mycroft made a considering noise,

“I suppose so,” he paused considering the question from all angles, paused long enough for Greg to notice,

“What is it?” he asked,

“It’s just that I wonder how many people don’t go back even for the first set of results, how many people just assume that they’ve got the virus. It doesn’t strike me as a very good strategy. I wonder what the ‘no show’ figures are. I’ll get someone to find out...”

Greg smiled at him, a genuine smile that made Mycroft’s toes curl,

“Why do I suppose that the provision of sexual health clinics in London is about to get the audit of its life?” Greg asked. Mycroft returned the smile before he stooped to pick up Greg’s suit jacket,

“Well, there’s nothing wrong with making sure that things are being done right, is there?”

“Guess not, just try not to give anyone fits, OK? They were very nice really.”

Mycroft turned to the wardrobe and hung up Greg’s jacket, when he turned back Greg was still sat on the edge of the bed, staring into space, eyes unfocused,

“Come on, love, you can’t fall asleep like that, you’ll pitch forward and break your nose!”

Greg yawned and made an attempt to pull himself together, standing and beginning to put on the jogging trousers he usually wore to bed,

“Wouldn’t be the first time,” he muttered,

“No,” Mycroft agreed, “but I would quite like it if you didn’t do it again, or let anyone else.” 

Mycroft was now straightening Greg’s trousers and hanging them over the back of the chair,

“You don’t need to do that,”

“I know that, but if I do, it’ll be one less thing for you to do in the morning and you’ll be able to stay in bed that little bit longer and frankly, you really look like you need that.”

Greg managed a nod in agreement through yet another yawn as he dragged himself to the bathroom. 

Mycroft made neat work of undressing and getting into bed, listening to Greg move around in the other room and waiting for him. When Greg emerged from the bathroom Mycroft pulled back the duvet on Greg’s side of the bed and as Greg got into bed Mycroft turned towards him,

“How was work?” he asked,

“Oh,” Greg replied round a yawn, “I was interviewing a bloke and if I’d broken off I’m not sure I’d have got him to talk again, you know how it is.” Greg yawned again.

“Go to sleep, love,”

“Thanks, My, see you in the morning,”

It took next to no time for Greg to drop off to sleep but far longer for rest to find Mycroft. When he was sure that Greg was asleep he found himself murmuring,

“I wish you’d called me.”


	4. Chapter 4

Indecision was not a natural state for Mycroft and considerably more than nine times out of ten when he did experience it his indecision related to Greg. In the end though he decided he couldn’t let Greg go to work without telling him about Adrian. Mycroft wasn’t sure that DI Reedley would even know what had happened yet, but if she did she would almost certainly mention Adrian in connection to himself and then the balloon would well and truly go up. There was no way, Mycroft reflected that this conversation was not going to go badly and working out what he was going to say and trying to predict in detail what Greg’s reaction was going to be made for a very short amount of sleep that night. It also meant that Greg woke up first, a very unusual event. 

“My? It’s time you were getting up love, come on, rise and shine!”

Even before he opened his eyes, Mycroft could ‘hear’ the fond smile in those words, the gentle teasing that always goes with being up before the person who’s usually up first,

“What time is it?” Mycroft asked, rubbing the sleep from his eyes,

“About six-thirty, you dirty stop-a-bed,”

Mycroft rolled over so that he was facing Greg,

“Come back to bed,” he suggested,

“Can’t do that, we both have to be up and at’em; I’ll make coffee.”

He turned and left the room and Mycroft flopped back on to his bed, his right arm crooked over his eyes. He allowed himself exactly thirty seconds before he got up and went into the bathroom.

 

Once he was fully dressed, Mycroft took a deep breath and went to the kitchen. Greg had his back to him when he entered the room, leaning on the counter, doing something with toast and Mycroft took a moment to watch him, to assess whether his weight had stabilised yet, to picture him in the same attitude, naked, to wonder if that would ever happen again, before he cleared his throat,

“Greg, there’s something I need to tell you,”

He turned, smiling and wiping his hands on a tea-towel,

“That sounds bloody ominous, don’t tell me you’ve decided to quit international intrigue, sweep Mrs Hudson off her feet and open up a bar on a tropical island!”

“Strangely,” Mycroft replied with a small smile that felt incredibly inappropriate, “that’s not it. Did you say something about coffee?”

Greg, looking more serious turned to pour a cup and then sat down,

“What is it?”

 

“So even after I asked you not to get involved you just went ahead anyway?”

It was said quietly but that in no way made it easier for Mycroft to bear. For a moment Mycroft knew an urge to plead, to make this into an emotional scene because in some respects that would be far easier. Mycroft knew that he could manipulate the situation but that was how he’d got into this mess in the first place,

“I spoke to DI Reedley and she confirmed that the case was,” he paused, choosing his words, “perhaps not being given the priority it deserved. All I did...”

Greg interrupted,

“All?”

“All I did was to put some of my people in the area to talk to people and see if what happened to you had happened to other people. Is that really that bad? I did not send them in even really to investigate, just to give DI Reedley the ammunition she needed to further her investigation.”

“Yeah, but that’s not where it stopped is it?” Greg’s tone was clipped and both impatient and clearly angry, but Mycroft hoped that the fact that he wasn’t giving full rein to his anger was a good sign,

“No,” Mycroft agreed, “things did not go completely to plan. You see Adrian ... in retrospect using Adrian was a mistake he’s too ... attached ....” Greg bristled slightly and Mycroft hastened to continue, “No, sorry, poor choice of words, there’s nothing you should know about Adrian. I have to admit that you already know all there is to know about my sexual history. No, Adrian is a true patriot, with a fierce love of his country and a burning desire to serve. Unfortunately the ... people ... at Vauxhall couldn’t see past his sexuality to see that truth about him. I gave him a chance and he has been very grateful.”

“Has he ever...” Greg’s question petered out but Mycroft took the meaning,

“I believe he sees me as a mentor or perhaps a benefactor,

“So?” Greg’s tone was still somewhere between hostile and sceptical,

“So? Adrian could tell that this was very important to me and, I believe, he also felt a moral imperative: that if such things are going on they need to be stopped.”

There was a long pause and in the end Mycroft spoke again,

“I think it would have seemed to Adrian that any right-thinking member of society would have done what he did.”

“So I’m supposed to believe that this morally upright ‘spy’,” Mycroft winced slightly at the term but Greg took no notice, “just happened to catch someone in the act of spiking someone’s drink?”

Genuinely confused for a moment, Mycroft asked a question of his own,

“As opposed to what?”

When Greg answered after a wait that seemed to go on for a life time, his voice was quiet and clipped, it was clear that Mycroft had misread the situation earlier; he was as angry as Mycroft had ever seen him,

“You know very well what! Did _you_ ,” the word was emphasised with a jabbed forefinger, “send him after the bloke from before?”

Mycroft felt a surge of anger of his own and clamped down on it determined not to let it show in his voice or body language,

“Of course not. You asked me not to.”

“I asked you to leave it to the police, but you didn’t manage that.”

That stung Mycroft and he was aware that this time Greg would have no trouble spotting the anger in his voice as he replied,

“No, actually you didn’t, you asked me not to deal with the man we identified. I have not, even though his very presence in the city is like a constant headache. All I have done is to provide the manpower that the police would not.”

Greg gave a mirthless laugh and Mycroft’s anger intensified,

“I am not lying to you.”

“Really? Is this some sort of Holmesian finessing of the term?”

Mycroft stood up straighter and knew that he was bristling and that it was unhelpful and that it was going to escalate things,

“I am not lying to you.”

Greg didn’t reply contenting himself with a sceptical look,

“I am not lying to you. Do you imagine I employ fools? Do you think that the police are the only people with observational skills, the only people who can marshal intelligence; I would have thought that working with my brother would have shown you that was not true. I sent some of my best people in to that area of town; frankly I would have been extremely worried if they had not turned some information up at the least.” Mycroft swallowed and tried to get his temper back under control, “Whether you believe me or not, would you really expect that _anyone_ would just watch somebody be drugged and led away? What the hell should Adrian have done?” and despite his attempt to calm things down, Mycroft was horribly aware of the near shout in which he ended that question.

“I expect? I expected that he wouldn’t have been there in the first place. OK so it came out all right for that poor bastard because you couldn’t stop yourself, that’s no fucking excuse, I asked you not to and you decided that my preferences were what, unimportant, less important than your need to be doing something, your need to be the knight in shining armour? I don’t need you to rescue me, to make everything OK; I’m not some damsel in distress, who needs big, strong you to make everything all right!”

Almost abstractedly Mycroft noted the fact that Greg was breathing hard, 

“You think that is what this is about?”

“Well, isn’t it? How could it be anything else? I’ve demonstrated time and again what a pathetic bastard I’ve become since this all happened, God knows I know it well enough, I don’t need you to point it out to me at every verse end!”

“I don’t think that you’re pathetic.”

Mycroft said it quietly, the anger suddenly draining out of him to be replaced by apprehension that Greg would treat anything he said right now as condescension. Indeed Greg let out an angry snort of laughter,

“Right. I’ve had enough of this,”

Mycroft felt a burst of adrenaline course through his body,

“Enough of what?” he asked, hating what seemed to him to be the blatant note of pleading in his voice,

“Enough of this conversation,” and with that he turned and walked out of the kitchen, back towards the bedroom, leaving Mycroft wondering how completely he’d stuffed things up.

 

Mycroft had never found it difficult to focus on his work. During the hard times before, during and after Graham his ability to focus on work had been the saving of him. That said it was difficult today and even though he tried hard to present his usual demeanour he was aware that Anthea at least had picked up on his distraction. It was no surprise therefore when she walked into his office a little after lunchtime.

“Was there something?” he enquired. It was a vain hope that she of all people would be cowed by a cool reception,

“I was hoping that you would tell me that,” she replied, “something is clearly causing you some distress and I would like to know if there is anything I can do to help.”

Mycroft briefly covered his eyes with his right hand,

“Is it obvious?” he asked, ashamed of the question and worried about the response,

“Not in the slightest,” she answered crisply, “it’s more that you had looked more ... content, and today you seem ill at ease again.”

She didn’t ask any further questions, she merely waited for him to reply and Mycroft knew that if he told her there was no problem, whilst she wouldn’t believe him she would drop the matter. He thought for a moment considering his options before he spoke,

“Sit down, would you.”

 

“So he’s angry because you involved yourself in the investigation and yet, right back at the start he didn’t argue?”

“Yes,”

“Were the police really not putting the man-power into the case it deserved?” She looked quizzically at him, waited for a beat and then continued, “What I mean is, if this had been any other member of the public would it have merited more of an investigation?”

Mycroft thought about it. His gut reaction was that if this had happened to a woman then there would have been more action taken, but, faced with the question he realised that this was not the case, 

“I’m not sure,” he said quietly and Anthea waited for him to continue, “I’ve been working on the assumption that it would, that it was some sort of ‘institutional homophobia’,” he could hear the doubt in his own voice as he stopped speaking, and he looked back to Anthea, “Have I just been looking for an excuse to be able to try and ‘sort this out’?”

“I doubt that,” she replied, “but it’s possible that you haven’t been thinking as clearly as you do most of the time, which isn’t to be wondered at,” there was a long pause before she continued, “That said, I think he has probably overreacted to what you did, like I said he didn’t argue when Dr Watson and your brother and you were involved the next day.”

It did slightly warm Mycroft to have someone on his side, but that feeling was quickly knocked out of the way by the surge of adrenaline brought about by the idea that he and Greg were on different sides of anything. He felt the need to defend Greg,

“To be fair ‘right back at the start’ I don’t think he exactly knew what he was feeling, in this case the actual fact of the assault was actually less traumatic than dealing with the aftermath has been.” Mycroft paused, “He imagined that he would just get over it, even though I know he would never expect anyone else to believe that. Right back at the beginning he wasn’t thinking past catching the criminals, he was trying desperately hard to make this into just another case, where he’d call in my brother and Dr Watson and it would all be solved in short order and everything could go back to normal.” He stopped speaking, and swallowed trying to clear the tightness in his throat that came on the rare occasions when he allowed himself to think specifically about ‘before’ as it pertained to Gregory and himself. “When we ... identified that first person, I should have just acted then, instead I hesitated and Greg asked me not to interfere; doing nothing, while knowing who at least one of the men involved, has been one of the hardest things I’ve ever done, if that makes sense.”

“It makes perfect sense, sir,” Anthea replied and again she paused, fidgeting with the cuff of her jacket. Mycroft noted this and knew that in her it was a sign of some inner turmoil. Eventually she looked up and spoke, 

“I could walk out of this room with a name and have the bastard in our custody within the next half-hour; you wouldn’t even have to say the word.”

It would have been wrong to say that she looked eager, what she looked, Mycroft realised, was massively competent and perfectly capable, and, God help him he wanted almost more than anything to reach for a scrap of paper and write down that name. It took longer than it should have done for him to shake his head,

“No. I can’t think of anything that I would like more, but if I’m to salvage things with Greg then I can’t, I’ve made enough of a mess of things already.”

Anthea continued to sit, not staring at him but waiting in patience for him to follow his thoughts through to a logical conclusion.

“I should go to him and apologise, make sure that he knows how sorry I am that I went against his wishes.”

Anthea already had her BlackBerry in her hand,

“I’ll rearrange your meetings for the rest of the day and,” there was a brief pause, “I can easily manage up until lunchtime tomorrow, if I remember Inspector Lestrade’s off duty?”

“Thank you, my dear, what would I do without you?”

“Hire someone else!” she replied with one of her rare, brief smiles.

Mycroft knew better than to argue, and anyway they were both aware that she was irreplaceable.

 

As he walked towards Greg’s flat Mycroft found that he was walking more and more slowly, for the first time he wasn’t sure of his welcome, wasn’t even sure that Greg would be at home and whether if he wasn’t there he should let himself in or not. When he got to the front door, key in hand, he hesitated. Twice he reached towards the door and failed to knock before he squared his shoulders and used the key that he had in his other hand,

“Greg? Are you home?” there was a catch in his voice that made him blush when he heard it, but there was no answering call. Still, as things were he checked that Greg was not just sitting somewhere fuming and refusing to answer. He wasn’t. Mycroft stood for some moments, weight on the balls of his toes as he tried to work out whether to go to NSY and talk to Greg then and there. It was what he wanted to do, it was what he would have done a few months ago, but now all he could see was that he might show Greg up. He took a deep breath and letting his shoulders drop he turned back towards the hall and carefully took off his jacket, hanging it carefully on the hat rack. His tie followed it and he was deliberately rolling his sleeves when he came back into the room. He slipped out of his shoes before sitting on the sofa and making the attempt to find something to watch on television that might distract him even if only for a moment.

 

By half-past eight there was no denying that Greg was late. Mycroft had reached for his phone half a dozen times, each time pulling his hand back, sometimes tucking his hand under his leg, occasionally picking up a newspaper from the coffee table. This all seemed so familiar, so terrifyingly familiar. Nothing could have happened to him, on some levels Mycroft was sure of that, and yet he’d been here before and sitting waiting was making him relive that evening, making him confront the conclusions he’d jumped to.

When Greg opened the door at quarter to ten Mycroft had given way to his anxieties to the extent that he had his phone in his hand, contacts open but none selected; he hurriedly put it down and turned to look at Greg, trying to clear his expression, aware that Greg might also be reminded of that night. Greg was looking at him, almost like he didn’t recognise him for a second,

“Oh, My,” he said, “I wasn’t sure whether you’d be here.”

It was hard to detect any great enthusiasm in Greg’s voice but equally it was easy to tell quite how tired he was and much though he wanted to seek reassurance from Greg, Mycroft was determined not to make this about himself and he did not answer the implied question, settling on one of his own instead,

“You look like you’ve had a hard day, sit down, I’ll get you a drink and something to eat.”

Greg was in the process of dumping his jacket and the bag he was carrying as he replied,

“A cup of tea would be great, but I don’t want anything to eat,” he managed an unconvincing smile, “too knackered. Have you had something?”

“Yes, I’m fine,” Mycroft lied, walking into the kitchen, “I’ll just brew up for both of us.”

Again that drew a tired smile from Greg,

“Yeah, you brew up my old china,” he replied with the most awful Dick van Dyke accent.

And that was how the short remain of the evening continued, with humour, with nothing discussed, nothing resolved and finally with Greg gently snoring and Mycroft lying awake again.


	5. Chapter 5

Mycroft did not sleep well and he was up well before Greg. He was making a proper breakfast when Greg walked into the kitchen but it was impossible to detect any great enthusiasm in Greg’s reaction,

“You’re up early, and cooking,” he said with a very forced looking smile,

“Well,” Mycroft replied with what he hoped was a less forced smile, “I thought we could both do with a good start to the day.”

“Yeah, sure,” Greg said. 

Mycroft passed him a slice of toast, 

“Just to be going on with.”

Greg smiled again, looking a little bit more like he meant it, but it didn’t escape Mycroft’s notice that the toast was all he ate, despite his best efforts. Mycroft could understand he supposed, the thought of the conversation that stopped rather than finishing yesterday didn’t exactly leave him feeling much like eating. But it had to be done,

“About the suspect...”

Mycroft stopped speaking as he saw Greg tense up,

“Look, My, I don’t want to talk about it. I’ve already said what I think, that hasn’t changed, what would be the point of discussing it anymore? I’ve got to go and get dressed.”

Mycroft watched him leave the room as he wondered what on earth he could do to make the situation better. _Time heals all wounds_ he thought to himself, a proverb of which his grandmother had been fond and suddenly it seemed to him to be a sinister thought. The problem was he still didn’t know what other than give it time he could do to mend things and he supposed perhaps he was putting too much emphasis on his own need to be forgiven rather than Greg’s need to process what was going on. _It’s not about me_ , he thought and put his mind to coming up with an evening meal for them that would tempt Greg’s lack lustre appetite.

Mycroft made absolutely sure he left work at a reasonable time, picked up the ingredients for himself (although he wasn’t entirely sure why it felt like he needed to do the shopping, why he thought it would make a difference), and prepared everything to cook Greg’s favourite steak when he came in. He got into the flat and was aware straight away that someone was there. 

While theoretically his job was strictly back-room there was always the possibility that he would attract unfriendly attention, he had been trained and he did have an extremely good memory for where he had left things. Silently he put down the bag he was carrying and slipped out of his shoes to pad forward towards the living room. It wasn’t a big room; a quick glance told him there was no one in there and he continued on towards the bedroom. He kept his sigh of relief inaudible as he realised the shape in the bed was Greg, before moving directly to worrying what Greg was doing home in bed when he was supposed to be working. He spoke in the ridiculous voice a person uses when they want to know if someone’s asleep but they don’t want (much) to wake them,

“Greg? Are you OK?”

There was a grunt from the bed, followed by a tightening of the bedclothes as Greg pulled them close around himself,

“Migraine,” he croaked, “had to come home,” there was a long pause, “sorry.”

“Can I get you anything?” Mycroft asked,

“No, just need to sleep.”

That seemed to be all that Greg was inclined to say and Mycroft had nothing to do but quietly move back to the discarded bag of shopping and put things away. He found himself looking at the steak and trying to decide whether to put it in the freezer or the fridge. It didn’t seem likely that Greg was going to feel like eating that night. In the end it went into the freezer and Mycroft mused on the fact that it was probably only going to be fit to make a very expensive steak pie in the end.

Mycroft spent the evening working, accessing information from work on his laptop, mentally deciding on what was the next thing that would need his attention. He didn’t often focus on what it was he did, as opposed to doing it but this evening he was inclined to consider it. One definition might be troubleshooting although truth to be told if things got as far as actual ‘trouble’ he counted that as an abject failure. He’d tried to explain it to Greg once as ‘smoothing the way’, ensuring that things occurred with the minimum of fuss. Greg had asked him what things he meant, clearly confused as to his relationship with the current government and with former governments for that matter. It had taken Mycroft time to make him realise the distinction between the government and the civil service and how on occasion the one side-stepped the other and the conversation had moved onto other, lighter subjects.

Some days later though Greg had come back to the subject,

“So who decides what things need to be smoothed so that they happen and what things need a road-block to stop them happening?”

It had taken Mycroft a second to work out what Greg was talking about and to frame a reply that wasn’t a bald ‘Me’,

“I suppose I do, my staff does, we are ... able, as the government who have to worry about re-election and constituents is not, to take the long view, to see the road further ahead.”

“And what if you can’t see properly, what if you get it wrong?”

“It hasn’t happened so far,” Mycroft replied, aware that Greg was unlikely to let the thing go with that, “If we got it wrong, we would put it right. We do on occasion have to take direct action to deal with a situation, though it is much the less preferable option.”

Greg had stared at him for just longer than was comfortable after he said that and then turned the conversation again to other matters. 

Mycroft wondered now if Greg had ever completely stopped thinking about that conversation and whether it was part of his anger at his involvement in the investigation. Did Greg consider that he was just an ... unevenness ... to be smoothed over? And once he’d thought of that Mycroft couldn’t shake the idea that while Greg clearly wasn’t that perhaps he had treated Greg’s assault in that way. Not for the first time Mycroft found himself thinking that he must do better when it came to Greg and when got into bed behind Greg who was gently snoring he found sleep elusive as the idea refused to be dismissed.

 

The next morning Greg was up at his normal time, and seemed quite chipper,

“Sorry about last night, did you get yourself something to eat?”

“No need to apologise, I didn’t starve. Are you feeling better?”

“Oh, yes, sleep’s always the thing.”

Their conversation continued in the same vein, neither of them quite answering the questions posed. Mycroft was horribly aware of the superficiality of the conversation, aware that he hadn’t fully answered a question at the same time as being sure that Greg was doing the same thing. It was horrifying to Mycroft, it reminded him so much of conversations with Graham, the only difference being that he was trying not to upset Greg for a different reason. 

“I was wondering if you would like to go out for a meal this evening?” he asked Greg when they were both more or less ready to set off for work.

Greg paused considering the question before he replied,

“Not sure,” he said, “I probably need to work over to make up for yesterday...”

“It’s not your fault that you were ill, surely someone will have taken up the slack?” Greg raised his eyebrows slightly and whether it was at the speed of his reply, or at what he’d said, Mycroft couldn’t decide. He continued, “All I meant was that I don’t seem to have seen much of you lately and it would be good to take you out.”

“And I’d love to go,” Greg replied turning to get his coat and not meeting Mycroft’s eye, “but I really can’t this evening. Can we do it some other time?”

Mycroft took a deep breath,

“I intend that we will go out for lots of meals,” he said with an attempt at a grin, “yes, we’ll do it sometime when you’re less busy. I’ll see you later.

That night it was gone ten o’clock when Greg got home and he went straight to bed leaving Mycroft to climb into bed beside his sleeping partner again and wonder whether he was just imagining it that Greg was sleeping more than he had been. He lay awake for a long time trying to convince himself that this was a good thing. Still, they both had the weekend free and Mycroft consoled himself that they would be able to get things sorted out then.

 

Friday night Greg came home clearly exhausted. Mycroft was already at home and changed out of his work clothes and a single glance at Greg sent him to the kitchen to make a cup of tea. When he brought the mug back into the room Greg was already sprawled in the corner of the sofa, eyes closed,

“Bad day?” Mycroft asked setting the tea down on the coffee table, sitting down on the sofa but slightly away from Greg.

Greg sat up slightly and managed a lack lustre smile,

“Not really, I’m just knackered, there doesn’t seem to be enough sleep in the world at the moment.” He stifled a yawn.

“Here, turn round,” Mycroft replied, and patted his lap. Greg gave him a grateful smile and flipped himself round until he could put his head on Mycroft’s knee,

“That feels good,” he said as Mycroft began to run his hands gently through his hair. He was asleep within a couple of minutes but Mycroft continued the soft rhythmical pull over and over for some time, certainly until he was sure that Greg was properly asleep. Part of him wondered if he should have insisted that Greg ate something but the grateful smile and seeing him peaceful when Mycroft was around was too good to be wasted. Mycroft was content to lose himself in the feel of the fine, short strands of hair and to simply stare at Greg until gently he also fell asleep.

 

It was half-one when Greg woke up suddenly and startled Mycroft awake at the same time. Mycroft worked out where he was soonest but both of them were groggy to say the least,

“Sorry,” Greg croaked out as he sat up and Mycroft’s heart rate slowed to merely a purr, “I was dreaming, woke up and didn’t know where I was.

“I should have woken you sooner instead of going to sleep myself,” he looked at his watch, “good job neither of us has work tomorrow,” he continued,

“Yeah,” Greg agreed, standing up and reaching down to give Mycroft a hand up. As Mycroft let himself be pulled up they ended up chest to chest and it seemed the most natural thing in the world for Mycroft to lean in for a kiss but Greg jerked away before stopping himself and giving Mycroft a peck on the cheek. It was on the tip of Mycroft’s tongue to apologise, but Greg spoke before he did, “Sorry, I’m all ... manky from work, you don’t want to be kissing me!”

Mycroft dredged up a smile even though it was hard to think of anything he felt less like doing,

“I find I don’t care, kissing you ‘manky’ is so much preferable to kissing anyone else in any state,”

“Kind of you to say so,” Greg replied but he still pulled away and headed to the bathroom and by the time that Mycroft got out of the bathroom he was either genuinely asleep or determinedly pretending.

 

“What should we do with this fine Saturday morning?” Mycroft asked as they sat over breakfast coffee the following morning. Greg looked down at his cup, not meeting Mycroft’s eyes,

“I’m knackered,” and at that he glanced up at Mycroft, a quick furtive check on Mycroft’s reaction, “would it be too awful if I went back to bed?”

“Of course not,” Mycroft responded, not if you’re tired. I wondered about booking us a meal for this evening?”

“Yeah, that would be great. I’m sorry I’m not much fun, I know,”

Mycroft interrupted,

“You’re not required to be entertainment, I’ll just make you some breakfast and then you can go on and get caught up on your sleep.”

“Don’t make anything for me,” Greg replied, “I’m too tired to be hungry,” and when he caught sight of Mycroft’s worried expression, “I’ll make up for it tonight, I’m sure.”

“If you’re sure?” Greg nodded, “Then away with you, I’ll wake you with plenty of time for this evening if you’re not up sooner than that.”

As he reached the door, Greg paused,

“What will you do while I’m being a drag?”

“I’ve got some bits and pieces I need to buy and then I may call in at the V&A.”

“You’re sure you’ll be OK?”

“Yes, of course, now the sooner you get to sleep the sooner you’ll feel better.”

 

Mycroft had been almost truthful when he said what he was going to do and where he was going to go. What he had nearly said but decided against was that he was going to call in on Baker Street. He knew that if he had told Greg he would have jumped to conclusions and conclusions that were unfortunately accurate; he wanted to talk to John. He crept into the bedroom, not sure whether Greg was asleep or just pretending, and quickly picked out a suit and tie. Back out in the living room Mycroft found himself taking a ridiculous amount of care with his clothes, _putting my armour on_ , he thought, _it’s ridiculous_ , but that didn’t stop him.

Until he rang the doorbell it didn’t occur to Mycroft that Sherlock and John might be on a case or indeed out and for a second he was taken aback by how comparatively little he kept an eye on his brother since the advent of John Watson. Unsurprisingly it was John who answered the door,

“Good morning John,”

“Mycroft! This is a surprise, usually you just come on up.” John looked him up and down and continued, “Come in. His lordship is lounging around the flat half-clad as usual, but I dare say you got used to that years ago.”

It had been too much to hope for that John would be in and Sherlock would be out and Mycroft could feel himself stiffen up. Then he forced himself to relax, after all Sherlock had known Lestrade for longer than he had, he might be able to offer some insight and Mycroft knew that he was in no position to be superior.

As he walked into the living room of the flat, strewn as usual with the ephemera of scientific experiment and detective work, Sherlock looked him up and down once and drew maddeningly accurate conclusions,

“You’re here about Lestrade, you’re worried about him and you want to know what John thinks as a doctor.”

There wasn’t even the pretence of a question about it and to deny what they both knew was true would be stupid and childish, but before Mycroft could speak John turned to look at Sherlock with an exaggerated expression of patience,

“Sherlock, could you give us the room?”

Mycroft noted both the brief look of triumph (for John’s acceptance of Sherlock’s reading of the situation) and the longer expression of irritation at being dismissed. Mycroft spoke before Sherlock could,

“No, don’t worry John,” the implication was clear to all of them: Sherlock would just eavesdrop so he might as well stay. “Sherlock has known Greg for longer than either of us, he possibly has insights that we don’t.”

Sherlock beamed.

“OK, then,” John continued, “sit down and tell us about it.”

Both of them sat down, and then Sherlock sprawled along the sofa, his head resting on John’s thigh. He completely ignored John’s momentary irritation and his less momentary puzzlement as to where to put his right hand before he settled for gently resting his elbow on Sherlock’s forehead. Mycroft would have endured torture rather than admit that it warmed him slightly to see Sherlock so ... accepted he supposed the word was. That feeling had been a long time coming for both of them. 

Sherlock spoke,

“He doesn’t know where to start and he feels like he shouldn’t be discussing Lestrade behind his back.”

“You’ve picked an irritating time to suddenly ‘get’ emotions, little brother,” Mycroft snapped, knowing he was being childish about it all.

“Now, now, children,” John said with a faint smile, “seriously, Sherlock, let him speak.”

Mycroft opened his mouth to do just that and then closed it again before he slumped forward, running his hands through his hair,

“I feel like I’m losing him, he seems to get more distant each day and I don’t know what to do.”

 

It took Mycroft some time to tell John what was going on and on a couple of occasions he faltered, the mere act of speaking aloud what had happened making him fully realise how things must have seemed to Greg. When he told the pair of them about what had happened with Adrian, John put his hand gently over Sherlock’s mouth; Sherlock rolled his eyes but Mycroft appreciated it, it wasn’t as if he could feel much worse about the situation. When he got to the end, they all sat in silence for a little while before John spoke,

“I think there are probably at least two things going on here. I’ll say what I think but please try and keep in mind that I’m not taking sides here, you’ve both been very good for each other and it would be good if you got back to that.” He paused, and Mycroft realised that he was waiting for his say-so to carry on. Mycroft swallowed his mouth suddenly dry and managed a nod.

“OK, I’ll take the medical first. It is possible, probable even that Greg is suffering from a mild depression, the changes to his sleep patterns, the disinclination to do things and the irritability all point to that diagnosis.”

It was confirmation of something Mycroft had considered himself,

“It’s not to be wondered at I suppose,” he said quietly staring at his hands, “I had wondered, but,” he paused, “I’ll never get Greg to acknowledge that he’s depressed,” he looked up, “and really should I? Won’t it just make it worse? All through this bloody situation he’s ... the thing that’s worried him has been that this showed him as somehow less than he was. People at work would think he couldn’t look after himself, he’d never get over being scared, that people were looking at him funny. How do I get him to admit there is a problem without making that worse?”

They were all silent for a moment or two before Sherlock spoke,

“I don’t think that anything you do will make this worse. Long-term depression does not often just ‘get better’, we both know that.”

John looked puzzled and for a moment Mycroft thought he was going to ask but his training held,

“You could just leave him, keep watching, encourage him to do the things that he enjoys, try and persuade him to take some exercise, all of those things would help. But be aware that they won’t be anything close to instant fixes. Above all you have to encourage him without ever sounding like you’re telling him to ‘pull himself together’, believe me if it were that simple no one would ever be depressed.”

“He’s not the easiest of men to ‘jolly along’ at the best of times, and I would be worried that he would realise what I was thinking and that would make things even worse.”

“I agree,” John replied, “you just need to take the opportunities you can.” He paused for a moment, “Do you ever do anything sporty?”

“We went to a driving range once, a few weeks back, Greg seemed to enjoy it.”

“That’s a good place to start then, suggest you go again, it won’t seem weird because you’ve done it once already. Just be aware you might need to keep suggesting until you just happen to get him at one of the times when he’s not too bad. Make it seem like something you really want to do.”

“He’ll know,” Mycroft began, but Sherlock interrupted,

“You can act, you’re a good actor, you use those skills and your people skills every day at work, use them now!”

John scowled at Sherlock but when he spoke it was obvious that to some degree he agreed with him,

“Sherlock’s right,” he said with a slight grimace, “this is not the time to not use everything at your disposal. It really wouldn’t be like you were treating him like work.”

They were all silent for a little while as Mycroft considered what they had both said. Finally he asked a further question,

“And what is the second thing?” 

“I think he thinks you are going to decide he’s too much trouble and walk away.”

“I would never...”

John interrupted,

“I know you wouldn’t but then I’m not Greg, I haven’t been through what he’s been through,” Sherlock looked up at John when he said that, but John merely continued to speak, “he’s never really been that confident that anyone would possibly care about him and now he is wrestling with the idea that he’s damaged goods, he’s not necessarily thinking that clearly.”

“So what do I do about that?” Mycroft asked,

“Stick by him, keep demonstrating that you’re not going away, keep your temper even when he seems to be trying to push you away...”

“Make sure that none of your minions are carrying out clandestine investigations,” Sherlock inserted. John continued as if he hadn’t spoken,

“Trust that things will get better and keep an eye on the depression symptoms, especially if he begins to have lots of little illnesses, the sort of thing that wouldn’t have kept him off work in the past but does now. It’s important that he doesn’t completely withdraw from the world.” John stopped speaking and fiddled with the cuffs of the sweater he was wearing, “One other thing, keep an eye on whether he’s taking his anti-virals, in his situation there is a tendency to feel it isn’t worth taking medication, it’s not exactly suicidal behaviour so much as just not seeing continued survival as something that important.”

 

Mycroft had stayed a little longer but John had given him a lot to think about and he intended to actually visit the V&A, no point arousing Greg’s suspicions unnecessarily after all. At the museum he wandered the ‘Handmade in Britain’ displays, taking in next to nothing, and paused at the gift shop to buy Greg some unaccountable peppermints just because he couldn’t for the life in him work out what they were doing in the gift shop for a design museum.

When he got back to the flat Greg was still asleep. Mycroft had decided that if it were at all possible he and Greg were going to go out for a meal and he had made reservations at a quiet place within walking distance of the flat, a place that Greg liked and where although they were known the staff wouldn’t make a fuss of them; he’d eaten once with Sherlock at Angelo’s and it had been excruciating. At about five o’clock he made tea and went to wake Greg up.

“Greg?” he said reasonably quietly and then again louder which produced at least movement, “I’ve brought you a cup of tea, it’s time you were getting up, I’ve reservations for seven at that place round the corner.” He moved around the bed and put one of the mugs on the cabinet at the side of the bed before he went back to the other side and sat down on the edge of the bed.

Greg didn’t seem inclined to move but Mycroft was sure that he was awake, so after a few moments of indecision Mycroft kicked off his shoes and arranged himself behind him and carefully draped his arm over Greg’s waist. It put him in the perfect position to nuzzle gently at Greg’s neck. Between gentle kisses he spoke,

“You really need to wake up, love. I’ve made you tea and we have reservations...”

Greg turned over so that they were face to face,

“Hiya,” he breathed and tucked himself in under Mycroft’s chin.

“Do you feel better for your sleep?” Mycroft asked,

“A bit,” Greg murmured, “don’t know what’s up with me and sleep at the moment, it’s like I’m catching up for all the sleep I missed the first couple of weeks, all at once. What time did you say it was?”

“I didn’t, but it’s just after five, we can have a nice leisurely cuddle,” and with this he tightened his grip on Greg just slightly, “and still have plenty of time to get to the restaurant.”

“I’m not sure,” Greg said quietly, sounding slightly nervous,

“Well I am,” Mycroft replied, “it will do us good to get out together. You know what I’m like, left to myself I’d never go out.” Mycroft could feel Greg’s half smile in response and he smiled himself, “Come on sit up, your tea’s getting cold. I brought you something from the V&A” he said and reached for the small box of mints.

“Mints?” Greg asked seemingly genuinely puzzled,

“Yes, that’s what I thought, I couldn’t see any reason for them, they aren’t branded for the museum, they are just entirely unaccountable.”

Greg managed a smile at that and Mycroft counted it a small victory.

 

It took some slight chivvying to get Greg out of bed and getting ready, it wasn’t anything so direct as reluctance, just that Greg tended to stop and stare into space or fiddle with things if Mycroft wasn’t prompting him. Seen through the lens of his conversation with John and Sherlock, it was blindingly obvious now and Mycroft was inwardly cursing himself. By quarter to seven they were ready to leave.

It was good, Mycroft found himself thinking, Greg had seemed to brighten up when they’d got to the restaurant and he’d eaten a full meal which was a rare enough event lately. By the time they got home, Greg was yawning and despite the fact that Mycroft couldn’t see how Greg could possibly be tired he suggested an early night. 

He went in the bathroom after Greg and steeled himself to look at Greg’s prescriptions. A quick calculation seemed to indicate that Greg had missed a few doses, but it could just as easily be that he picked up the prescriptions a day or two before he’d run out of the last lot. Something to keep his eye on, he thought.

It was a good feeling to get back to the bedroom and find Greg sat up reading instead of turned away and wrapped so far round himself that he might as well have been in another room. As Mycroft got into bed, Greg put down his book and turned slightly towards him.

“I’m sorry I’m being such a drag at the moment,” Greg began,

“You’re not,” Mycroft replied, “and even if you were it wouldn’t matter, you’re entitled.”

Greg managed a small smile,

“Well, I’m sorry anyway,” he said before he turned over and put out the lamp, “good night.”

Mycroft found it just slightly easier to get to sleep that night.


	6. Chapter 6

For the life in her Deb Reedley couldn’t decide what to do about this particular case. It was, as much as anything in her field of work was, a clear cut case. There was a witness, there were the results of blood-tests but there was a victim who seemed to be getting less likely to be co-operative with every passing moment. 

When she’d first interviewed him once the drugs were out of his system he had seemed keen to progress the case and grateful to the casual bystander (Deb found it best to stick to that description even in the privacy of her own mind) who had prevented much worse things happening. Now, though if she was any judge he was going to be uncooperative. And just to make matters extra wonderful she was going to have to take bloody Swindlehurst with her, there was no one else available. She decided it was better to get it over with on so many levels and squared her shoulders as she walked into the main office and caught Swindlehurst’s eye,

“Come on, sergeant, let’s go and see Mr Simpson.”

Swindlehurst stood up, catching hold of his jacket and then following behind. On some levels Deb felt like she ought to be chatting, but she was disinclined.

Their silence continued until they were getting into her car and she decided that she needed to make sure that they were both approaching this interview from the same place.

“We’re going to need to jolly Mr Simpson along.”

Her only reply from Swindlehurst was a non-committal grunt. Deb gritted her teeth and tried to continue in the tone that she would use for any of her other officers,

“I think he’s beginning to get cold feet about the whole thing, something along the lines of ‘nothing really happened, so what’s the point...”

“Well he would wouldn’t he?” Swindlehurst muttered and then continued in a more normal tone of voice, “So, why’s he getting the special treatment?”

The sneer in Swindlehurst’s voice made Deb grip the steering wheel far too hard but she forced herself to answer in a normal voice,

“Precisely because he is beginning to get cold feet...”

Swindlehurst snorted, a sound that could only be interpreted as ‘typical’.

Deb signalled and pulled over,

“What did you mean by that?” she asked, her voice quiet and calm,

“Just that this whole thing reeks of ‘buyer’s remorse’ has done from the start.”

“How do you figure that? I mean when it wasn’t him that even made the original complaint?”

“Oh, I’m not saying that he didn’t cop lucky when that bloke saw the drink being doctored but I’d be amazed if he didn’t know the suspect before the evening.”

Deb just about managed to keep her voice level,

“There’s absolutely no evidence that they knew each other, nothing that links the two of them at all.”

Swindlehurst looked at her with an almost pitying expression and the condescension in his voice was almost painful to hear,

“It’s just one of the games they play!”

“They?” she asked,

“You know what I mean.”

Deb started the car again and managed a neat u-turn before she spoke,

“I do know what you mean,” she replied, “and with that attitude I think this squad is all wrong for you. Be thinking about where you might want to be transferred, because I want you out of my department soon as.”

“What? Because I’m realistic about how poofters behave?”

Deb let the language slide but answered the question,

“No, because you can talk about any victim like that. Now for God’s sake shut up before you say something I can’t ignore and I end up having to take this to professional standards.”

The rest of the trip back to The Yard was silent.

Half an hour later she was back at Simpson’s flat, feeling thoroughly undermined. How could she in all conscience encourage this poor bloke to continue with the complaint when even members of her own staff could express such ludicrous opinions? She squared her shoulders and knocked at the door of his flat. It took a little while for him to come to the door,

“Oh, it’s you,” 

“Yes, can I come in Mr Simpson?”

“It’s not really convenient,” he began, before she heard a voice from inside the flat,

“What is it, Graham?” 

Behind Mr Simpson Deb could see a youngish woman peering out into the hallway. She could also see the unmistakeable look of appeal on Simpson’s face. Part of her wanted to force the issue but it wasn’t as if she was the morality police, if he was playing away on his girlfriend and that’s certainly what this looked like, what was it to her. She certainly wasn’t likely to get his cooperation if she ‘outed’ him now,

“Not to worry, I’m a police officer,” Deb said to the woman, vaguely flashing her warrant card at the same time, “we’ve had some reports of disturbances, but it seems that you haven’t heard anything?” When the woman shook her head Deb continued, more to Mr Simpson, “So, if you could just call in at the station and confirm that Mr...”

“Simpson,” he replied, relief obvious on his face,

“Then I won’t have to trouble you again.”

Deb turned and walked away. She’d given him something to work with if he wanted her not to know what was going on and hopefully he would be grateful enough to show up at the station, or the girlfriend would nag him enough to make him.

 

Three days later Mycroft was sure that Greg wasn’t taking his medication as he should, he was just completely incapable of deciding what to do about it. He’d checked the medication again while he was getting ready for bed and Greg hadn’t taken any more. It couldn’t go on, he wouldn’t watch Greg’s depression, if that was what it was, risk his future health even if talking about it meant huge arguments between them, but that didn’t mean that he couldn’t give some thought to the best approach to the situation, it would surely keep to the morning. Mycroft finished brushing his teeth and went into the bedroom. Greg was as was becoming usual determinedly wrapped up in the bedclothes with his back to the door and Mycroft reflected that he might as well be holding up a sign that said ‘leave me alone’. Mycroft got into bed and arranged himself as well as he could without disturbing Greg who he supposed might just be asleep and although he murmured ‘Good Night’ it was a full hour before he managed to sleep himself. His last conscious thought was to wonder if Greg was going to manage to get any proper rest that night.

By the look of him in the morning the answer to the question had been no, Greg looked like he’d been badly reanimated and the weary slump to his shoulders as he dragged himself into the bathroom told its own story. A little while later the two of them were sat at the table supposedly having breakfast although it hadn’t escaped Mycroft’s attention that Greg had managed about half a mouthful of the slice of toast he’d made. Still, he needed to get it said. He cleared his throat, feeling a little like he had at home when he was a small boy and was about to ask permission for something,

“Greg?”

“Mmm,” was the only response and it was obvious that Greg wasn’t listening. Mycroft tried again,

“Greg? Are you listening?”

Greg seemed to almost startle at the sound of Mycroft’s voice,

“Yeah? Sorry, miles away, didn’t really sleep that well last night.”

“I didn’t think you had,” Mycroft replied, “Greg,”

“This can’t be good, using my name twice,” Greg was clearly trying for a smile but not quite making it and the worst of it was that Mycroft couldn’t reassure him, there was no way that he was going to like what Mycroft was going to say,

“I couldn’t help noticing that you don’t seem to be taking your medication…”

Mycroft stopped speaking as he saw anger spark in Greg’s eyes,

“You’ve been checking up on me?”

“No, not really, it’s just that the packets are there in the bathroom cabinet, I couldn’t help noticing,”

“Couldn’t help noticing because you’re a nosey bastard?” Greg asked, “Where do you get off checking up on me?”

“I wasn’t checking up on you,” Mycroft began trying for placating but it was clear from Greg’s expression that nothing was going to placate him, “I’m just worried about you…”

“Worried about yourself, more like,” Greg replied getting up, “’I’m worried’” Mycroft steeled himself not to wince at the tone Greg used, the mocking tone he’d heard all through his school career and beyond, “that’s the excuse that every nosey bastard uses. Well for your information Mister-I-know-everything, I took the full bloody course for all the good it was likely to do. If you’d bothered to find out then you’d have known that I was only supposed to take them for twenty-eight days, so you can just piss off and stop treating me like a bloody mental incompetent.”

Mycroft didn’t know where to start but after a fraction of a second decided that the only possible start was an apology,

“I’m sorry. I should have realised or found out; it was just that I was worried about you…”

“No!” Greg almost shouted taking a couple of steps away before turning back, “You do not get to make this my fault!”

“That wasn’t what I meant…”

“Really? Because I think that’s exactly what you meant. You think I was only put on this Earth to avoid worrying you? Nothing should ruffle the world of Mycroft bloody Holmes? The Empire might fall because I’m worrying you? Nothing’s changed has it? It’s practically the same as you were saying before, it was OK for you to jump to conclusions because you’d been worried?”

Greg paused and an isolated part of Mycroft’s brain noted that he was out of breath while the rest of him felt almost dizzy, confused as to how this had gone quite so badly gone wrong. He sat up straighter, whatever happened he wasn’t going to let the last of Greg’s comments go by unchallenged,

“I never said that anything I did was OK. Everything I did was immeasurably far from OK. If it seemed like I was making excuses then I’m sorry again, there are no excuses to be made, I was completely, horribly wrong and I want to spend the rest of my life trying to make it right even though I can’t possibly do that.”

Greg took one more deep breath, his shoulders sagged and he looked down at the floor by Mycroft’s feet. Mycroft waited, not wanting to say anything more until he could get a handle on what Greg was feeling and thinking. Greg sat down again, slumped at the table and Mycroft still waited. When Greg finally spoke he did it so quietly that Mycroft could almost not hear him,

“That’s why I don’t think this … we … are going to work, you’ll always feel guilty and I just seem to veer between insanely angry and just so bloody tired. I’m hurting you and, seriously, your mind does need to be on your work.” He glanced up very briefly as if to gauge what Mycroft was thinking before he continued in the same quiet voice, “I don’t want to be responsible for Britain losing The Empire,” and at this he tried for a smile which Mycroft found was almost physically painful, “I’m broken, My and you need to go.”

“I will resign my job before it comes between you and me.”

The sentence was spoken before Mycroft had thought about it but when his brain caught up he found nothing wrong with it and he held Greg’s stare without any hesitation.

“You don’t mean that,” Greg replied sitting up straighter but his hesitant tone of voice told Mycroft that he wasn’t sure. Mycroft followed up his advantage,

“I do mean it, the country managed very well without me before I was born and will continue to flourish after I have gone.”

Greg continued to stare at him, all trace of his previous anger gone, replaced by an expression between puzzlement and surprise,

“You really mean it, don’t you?” he said.

Mycroft straightened slightly and fought the inclination to fiddle with his cuffs,

“I don’t very often say things I don’t mean.” For a moment he bit back the next sentence before he realised that leaving saying it would just mean that they would probably have another row at some later date. He took a deep breath, “I want to do whatever I need to do to get you back to yourself, you seem to be in very low spirits at the moment.”

For a couple of beats Greg almost looked ready to punch Mycroft and Mycroft in turn would have welcomed that response, but then it seemed like all the energy went out of him and he slumped back into his chair,

“I was going to say ‘what do you expect’, but I’d just be avoiding the issue. I know I’m not ‘right’ at the moment, I just don’t know what to do about it.”

Mycroft took the couple of steps towards him and squatted down to where he could look Greg in the eye before he spoke,

“What you do for a start off is let the people who love you help. There’s nothing we can’t get through together, I think we’ve proved that over the years, this won’t be any different.”

Greg leaned towards him and Mycroft gave him a clumsy hug, eventually dropping to his knees to hold him better as he began to feel the tension in him slowly decrease.


	7. Chapter 7

It had been clear to Mycroft that Greg really wasn’t fit for work and with the semi-breakthrough they’d just had Mycroft was certainly not going to give Greg chance to stew about it all again. He didn’t really give Greg any choice, he spoke as soon as they broke away from their hug,

“I’m going to ring you in sick,” Greg sat up straighter at this but Mycroft calmly regarded him until he slumped again. “If I talk to Sally will she be able to speak to the appropriate people? It won’t be a lie, you’re clearly not in any state to be working.”

“What are you going to tell her?” Greg asked in a dull, quiet voice,

“Just that you’re coming down with something.”

Mycroft could see that Greg was unhappy about this and he confirmed it when he spoke,

“No, don’t, I have to go to work, I’ve seen this happen to other people, and they never get back, and the things that people say about them and the jokes,”

Mycroft interrupted,

“Do you honestly think that anyone would dare say anything with Sergeant Donovan about? What did you actually think she or I were going to say to people?”

Greg looked away and in that moment he looked more lost than he’d looked since that first evening at 221B and Mycroft felt sick,

“Greg,” he said, “look at me.”

Greg looked down at the floor and Mycroft made his request again,

“Greg, look at me, do you think I would do this if I thought it was going to,” he struggled for the right words, “I don’t know, be the first step on some slippery slope, or lead to you never leaving the flat again? We will get through this, it will get better, believe me when I say it even if you can’t believe yourself when you say it. You will not let this beat you, we will not let this beat you, but that doesn’t mean that you have to deal with it all on your own, love, or even all at once.”

Greg tried to smile, trying to soften his words,

“I’ve seen stress and depression break a lot of people in the job, wouldn’t I just be kidding myself if I expect that I’ll be different?”

“How many of them got help before things had got too bad?” Mycroft asked, “How many of them had pushed their friends and families away before they asked for help? How many of them never had the courage to admit there was a problem before it was disastrous? How many of them had your courage?”

Greg laughed,

“What courage? Haven’t you heard me when I’ve told you how scared I am?”

“And yet, you continue, you do your work, you function far better than I think you are giving yourself credit for, yes, I know that you think you’re a wreck but that is only in comparison, compared to the generality of people you are more than holding your own. If you have to take a day or two then is that to be wondered at? How much time did you take after,” Mycroft swallowed, “the rape?”

Greg ducked his head in acknowledgement of what Mycroft was saying,

“About two days. But I don’t want to ruin that now,”

Mycroft could tell that he had almost persuaded Greg and so he continued,

“And I won’t let you ruin it, you need to catch up some sleep, you need to make plans about how you are going to get the help you need and you can’t do that when you’re running on empty. Tomorrow, when you’ve slept and when we know what you want to do next then I will be the one pushing you out of the door!”

Greg managed a smile at that, but his shoulders slumped before he answered,

“You need to ring the Chief Super, but could you let Sally know as well?” Greg looked around the room and Mycroft could still see some anxiety about him,

“I’m going to work from here this morning,” he said, “so you can sleep without worrying about anything happening, I’ll call you at about lunchtime and then we can make some plans.”

Greg smiled again, a little tremulously, but still a proper smile,

“I think I could sleep with you there watching out,”

“Then I’ll move a comfortable chair into the bedroom and work in there. Would some music on help?”

“It might at that.” There was a long pause and Mycroft knew that Greg wanted to say something, so he waited until he finally continued, “Are you sure this is worth all this?”

“I’m very sure that you’re worth it, very sure that we’re worth it. Now, get yourself back to bed, I’ll be in shortly.”

 

DI Reedley just barely managed to stifle a sigh as Mr Simpson left. The fact that she’d covered up for him with what turned out to be his wife had got her at least so much good will as to get him to the station, but she knew she’d never get him to testify, which left her with precisely nothing left in the case. The samples given by the suspect had failed to match with the samples that they’d gathered from Greg Lestrade and there now didn’t seem to be any chance they were going to get anyone for it unless they were stupid enough to do the same thing again and get caught, which seemed unlikely.

There were other cases, there were always other cases, far too many. Still, she thought, at least I’m not sending any of the poor buggers Swindlehurst anymore. It had been scarcely ten minutes work to arrange his transfer, people rarely did a lot of time on her squad, it usually became too much for them and she doubted whether it would really even be a black mark on his file, and dealing with it the way she had done meant that more of her and the rest of the squad’s time could be focussed where it would do most good.

Her email pinged and she winced slightly, I need to get out more, she thought, if every email is making me flinch, I need to get a bit more perspective. She reached for the mouse and opened the email. It was from forensics and she expected that it would be a procedural thing and was surprised to see a case number quoted a case number that she knew because she’d been looking at it five minutes earlier. They had a match, a match between the single tiny drop of semen collected at the scene and the Adrian had brought in. 

The grin spread slowly across her face. If she knew her psychology, Mr Madder would give up at least one of his ‘friends’ if he thought for a second it would get him a lighter sentence. Deb knew an urge to ring Greg and let him know and stifled it, she was too old a hand at this job to allow herself to count chickens that were still safely tucked up in their shells, making the phone call that said sorry, actually we’ve had to let them go was too bloody awful. Instead she pulled the file towards her yelled for one of the sergeants and began to work on making the whole bloody thing as water-tight as possible before they picked Madder up again.

 

Mycroft had genuinely intended to work quietly as Greg slept, but he was constantly distracted by watching Greg instead. The difference between how Greg was sleeping now and how he had been not-sleeping last night was dramatic. He’d started off cocooned as he’d been last night but now he was more sprawled, like, Mycroft realised, he used to sleep before the rape. It was difficult for Mycroft to face the word but he was determined to make himself, as he had done when Greg and he had been talking earlier; when Greg had had to face the actual thing it seemed cowardly beyond permission to flinch away from the word. Not for the first time Mycroft wished it was a word and a concept that neither of them had to face but that was stupid wishful thinking, it was what it was.

The other thing that occupied his mind and kept it from his work was the actual ‘mechanics’ of getting Greg the help he had so tentatively admitted he needed. There were, of course, people at work, well trained people, discrete people, Mycroft knew this because he’d hired them, appalled at the waste that used to treat people as disposable when (not if) it got too much for them. It was a matter of pride to Mycroft that this no longer happened with his people. Using one of his specialists would have its advantages, Greg would not know them, would be very unlikely to come across them in the course of his professional life and he could say what he wanted to them without having to take into account their feelings. The downside was whether he could be convinced that they would not report straight back. They wouldn’t of course, one of the reasons he’d taken such care to hire the very best was the surety that his people could rely on their discretion, and hadn’t that caused some problems with the older members of staff. But Greg was not at his least paranoid at the moment, so good though they were they were probably not an option.

There was John. Mycroft did not doubt for a moment that he would act as a counsellor to Greg and he was sure that Greg would trust John not to break confidences to him, but there was Sherlock, Sherlock who could deduce what John was thinking with alarming speed and accuracy. That might give Greg pause. There was of course, Ella, whom John had seen when he was first back from Afghanistan, but Mycroft dismissed her, she had shown an amazing lack of insight where John was concerned and he had no faith in her doing any better with Greg.

There was the Met. Mycroft spent a moment perusing their public website, coming across phrases like, ‘Sometimes pressures in and outside of work can impact adversely on our health.’ and ‘We actively support the physical and emotional health of staff’ and the information that a 24/7 counselling service was available. It seemed unlikely that Greg would go for that, he was already far too concerned about what people at work would think.

Greg stirred slightly and Mycroft redirected his attention. Greg was dreaming, a good sign Mycroft supposed but it didn’t seem like it was a good dream. Mycroft debated whether to wake him or not. Just because he was having a bad dream did not automatically mean that it was about the rape, it could be a perfectly ordinary, ‘need to get to court on time, but it’s across this minefield’ dream or the always popular, ‘I seem to have come to work without my trousers’ and surely Greg needed the sleep. Mycroft continued to watch, almost holding his breath, relaxing only when Greg’s rapid eye movement stopped and he dropped into a deeper sleep and Mycroft forced himself to turn his attention to work and making sure that he would be able to drop things quickly if Greg needed him.

 

“Greg?” Mycroft spoke in a quiet voice, wanting to wake Greg but not to startle him. He’d promised to wake Greg at lunchtime and although it seemed to him that waking him when he’d had so little sleep was stupid he was doing it anyway. “Greg?” this time he spoke more loudly, since it had become obvious that Greg was deeply asleep, and Greg stirred slightly, “Come on, love, it’s time you woke up.” Greg opened one sleepy eye,

“Time is it?”

Mycroft smiled and looked at his watch for confirmation,

“Just after one, I said I’d call you but if you feel like you could sleep some more…”

Greg shook his head and began to sit up,

“No, better not, don’t want to get to the wrong end of the day, it would be nice to sleep at night for once.”

“Yes, I see your point. I’ll get us some lunch, while you get dressed?”

“Thanks.”

 

As Mycroft pulled together a soup and sandwich lunch his real attention was on Greg, listening to the noises as he went into the bathroom and showered again, working out what clothes he was putting on by judging where his footsteps went to in the bedroom, trying to work out what would be the best way to get the next conversation going, wondering if Greg would still put up a fight about getting help, now that he was fortified by a few hours ‘proper’ sleep.

By the time Greg got to the kitchen door, Mycroft was just putting a frivolous garnish on his sandwich and the soup was steaming in matching bowls.

“That smells good,” Greg said and Mycroft smiled back at him,

“Tesco’s finest, but at least it’s their Finest, not Heinz!”

“I’m not sure it would have mattered, for once I’m starving.”

“Should I do something more substantial for lunch?” Mycroft asked,

“No, probably not,” Greg replied, “I shouldn’t push my luck, I know I haven’t been eating much.”

“That also will get better,” Mycroft replied, “Go through and I’ll bring it.” 

As Greg turned Mycroft picked up Greg’s soup and the other plate and followed him before going back for his own. Greg was starting to eat before he sat down himself, a very good sign and he hadn’t even needed to persuade Greg to eat. 

Mycroft kept the conversation light as they ate, he certainly didn’t want to do anything that would upset Greg’s new-found appetite, and they talked about inconsequential things like the quality of the soup and good natured ribbing about garnish on a weekday lunch. 

When they had finished Mycroft cleared away, taking his time to put the dirty dishes and cutlery into the tiny dishwasher before he went back. Greg was stood up by the window, looking out but Mycroft would not have bet that he was taking anything in. Mycroft waited but it became obvious that Greg was not going to be the first to speak, so Mycroft did.

“We said we were going to make some plans?”

 

It took some time for them to go through the pros and cons of the different approaches and Mycroft was surprised to find that Greg was prepared to discuss the use of medication to help,

“Well, it makes sense,” he said, “I wouldn’t refuse to take insulin if I were diabetic, if there’s something that can help then why would I not take it? I suppose that there’s, what do they call it, ECT?”

Mycroft was horrified at the thought,

“I think that’s only for more long-term problems than yours,” he said, flustered, “I mean they only do that when people are suicidal and other things haven’t worked and,”

Greg interrupted him, 

“Slow down, I don’t think it’s like Nurse Ratchett anymore, but if it will help and help quickly, why not?”

“Why not? Because it can cause memory loss, personality changes,” Mycroft could hear the slightly hysterical note in his own voice and abruptly stopped speaking. Greg was gazing at him with raised eyebrows and Mycroft forced himself to calm down, “Sorry, I just find the idea of someone running a few hundred volts through your brain more than a little worrying, I find I like your brain and your mind the way they are.”

Greg’s expression became more abstracted and there was a long pause before he responded,

“You can’t seriously like my mind the way it is at the moment,”

He didn’t phrase it as a question, but Mycroft treated it as if it had been one,

“You really have no idea do you? No idea of how … extraordinary you are.”

Greg ducked his head a little and Mycroft could make out a faint blush and just the edge of a smile as Greg replied,

“Oh, please, I know you want me to feel better but,”

Mycroft interrupted,

“Really. You are unfailingly positive about the human race in a way that I can’t be and this despite seeing how bloody awful people can be on a daily basis. You effortlessly get the very best out of your people, including my scapegrace brother. And as to the support you have given me…”

It was Greg’s turn to interrupt and the faint blush was now far less faint,

“Shut up! I don’t do anything out of the ordinary.”

“Yes, but you do. Practically everyone you meet at work is in the worst situation they have ever experienced, they are angry, frightened, homicidal on occasion and most of the time you treat them all with a courtesy far beyond what they deserve. You looked beyond everything that was obvious about Sherlock, the drugs, the smart-arsery and the arrogance and saw that he could help and you let him help where another man’s insecurities and machismo would have sent him away with a flea in his ear.”

Mycroft paused for breath and Greg interrupted,

“Don’t, please, My, I feel like I never was that person, like you’ll always be comparing before and after and I’ll never get back there.” There was a long pause and when Greg spoke again it was very quietly, “You’ll be disappointed.”

“That’s just the depression talking,” Mycroft countered and he saw Greg wince slightly at the word, “Even if you can’t see that you’ll get back there, I can, for the time being that will be enough. If you decide that ECT is the way to go then I’ll be with you, but I don’t think any doctor or therapist will suggest it as a first line treatment.”

“You’re probably right,” Greg replied, “it would just be nice if this could be sorted out quickly, but really I know this is likely to take a long time.” He looked to Mycroft, and Mycroft very much wanted to lie to him and tell him that it would all be sorted out quickly but he didn’t,

“It will take as long as it takes. I don’t think you need to worry about it taking forever, you’re acting to get help quickly, the depression hasn’t become an ingrained mental state, I doubt it will take very long.” Mycroft paused, “Have you decided who you want to see?”

“Do you think John would be prepared to talk to me? He still does shifts at the surgery doesn’t he? So he should be able to prescribe for me or, I don’t know, make a referral?”

“Yes, he does and I’m sure he will. What about Sherlock?”

“What about him?” Greg asked, looking genuinely puzzled,

“Are you concerned that John will discuss what you tell him with Sherlock?”

“I suppose I might be but for the fact that Sherlock will already have worked it all out and I trust John. He was great, you know, when…”

Mycroft did know when. It was difficult to think about it but he did know when,

“Yes,” he paused, not sure how to continue with what he felt he had to say but determined nonetheless, “I don’t think I’m ever going to be able to do enough for John to repay him for helping you when I didn’t.”

Greg looked up at him, fixing him with a direct stare,

“Yeah, he was wonderful, but you need to lighten up on yourself you know.” Again there was a long pause, while Greg still stared into Mycroft’s eyes and Mycroft didn’t feel that he could look away without it seeming like cowardice, “It’s me that gets to say whether you’re forgiven or not and you are. One of the worst things about what happened is the lack of control. With the drugs it’s not like I even tried to fight them, maybe that would have been worse, I don’t know, but what I was left with for a long time was the feeling that I had lost control of my life, it’s probably what made me feel angriest, it’s certainly what made me finally take control of the situation with my parents.” He stopped speaking again and left Mycroft wondering what if anything he should be saying. Before he reached a conclusion Greg continued,

“This depression, if that’s what it is that’s more ‘out of controlness’ and as much as anything that’s what I hate about it, not being able to control my thoughts, not being able to stop thinking about me. Don’t take this the wrong way but hell’s bells I’m bored with me right at this moment. That’s more how I feel than feeling sad, or down or discouraged, just unutterably bored with me. I know this will pass, or at least I trust that it will,” he acknowledged, “but now I need you to accept that you’re forgiven. I’ve made my decision, I’m not going to change my mind and throw you out. Let it go, My.”

Mycroft paused for a moment, trying to work out what to say to that,

“Thank you. This won’t mean that you won’t talk about what happened will it? I’m not sure that would be good for you.”

“No, what it means is that when I talk about it, you shouldn’t behave like it was your fault. It wasn’t your fault, there is no ‘I should have been there’ or ‘I should have protected you’ it just happened. Like you say I need to talk about it as much as I can, but I really need you not to flinch every time.”

“I’ll do my best,” Mycroft replied, “but I have something to ask also.”

Mycroft saw the subtle signs of Greg bracing himself and spoke hurriedly to try and reassure him,

“It’s nothing difficult, at least I hope it won’t be,” he paused assessing Greg’s wary expression and tightened muscles, “will you try and believe that I still see you in the same way, that I still want you? Don’t worry, I understand your reasons for not wanting to be … intimate, but I need you to believe that nothing that has happened has made me want you less, you don’t need to, you shouldn’t flinch, I’m not going to suddenly be repulsed by you.”

Greg looked away, supporting his head with one hand and Mycroft could see him blinking rapidly for a moment before he spoke,

“It’s one thing knowing it intellectually and another thing knowing it in the bone as it were and I suppose it’s the same for you accepting that I don’t blame you for any of it.” He looked back squarely at Mycroft, “I suppose we both just have to keep working at things, yeah?”

Mycroft reached for his free hand, holding it tightly,

“That’s all we both have to do.”


	8. Chapter 8

“You do know I’ve never really done this kind of in-depth counselling before don’t you?” John asked, one hand distractedly rubbing at his nose. “I mean I’ve taken courses and the like but there are people who have far more experience than I have,” he paused but Greg didn’t say anything and Mycroft was sure that in this case it wasn’t his place and eventually John continued, “I mean there’s Ella for a start off, you know the woman I spoke to when I was first invalided home?” At this Mycroft felt he had to speak,

“As I believe we discussed when we first met, she does not seem to be the most perceptive of people.”

John smiled slightly,

“Yes I remember what you said and you might have had a point but she was right about some other things,”

Greg interrupted,

“Do you not want to do this?”

Mycroft could tell that Greg was taking great pains to ask the question levelly and without showing how he was feeling about this situation but he’d never have agreed to Greg asking John to help if he’d thought for a second John was that lacking in empathy.

“No, it’s nothing like that; I just want to make sure you get the best help you can.”

Greg took a deep steadying breath,

“Well, I think that will be with you. There’s all sorts of reasons I don’t want to go to just anyone, Mycroft and his job, my job, it’s just … you know everything, I won’t have to explain at every verse end and I don’t want to have to be careful with what I mention and don’t mention and I don’t want My to have to worry about what I’m saying,”

“I’m not,” Mycroft said quickly. Greg smiled,

“I know you’re not, love, but you probably should be. I’m sure that any reputable therapist would not break confidence under normal circumstances but, you know, just occasionally circumstances round you and Sherlock aren’t normal, are they?”

“No, not always,” Mycroft admitted and then he took a deep breath, “If I’m honest and if John is prepared to try and help you I would prefer that.”

Greg smiled at him.

“You’re that sure that I can be trusted?” John asked, the question directed at Mycroft rather than Greg, “It wouldn’t worry you?”

“It’s not something I am concerned about.” Mycroft said quietly.

“Are you sure that you shouldn’t be?” It was the first contribution that Sherlock had made to the conversation and Mycroft was surprised at the lack of ‘side’.

“No,” he responded, “I trust everyone here.”

Even if it hadn’t been the truth, if he hadn’t meant it, it would have been worth saying just for the look on Sherlock’s face. What was perhaps more interesting however was the lack of surprise from John. _He is a puzzlement_ , Mycroft thought, _he has hidden depths_. Not for the first time he wondered if John would consider undertaking some freelance work. From the ‘hands off, he’s mine’ look on Sherlock’s face now he’d recovered from his surprise he’d already interpreted Mycroft’s speculative gaze.

“Right, well then,” John said, “what do you want to do about medication, Greg?”

“Do you think it would help?” Mycroft could hear the scepticism in Greg’s voice and the undercurrent of worry that went with it.

“Probably, if we can find the right antidepressant, unfortunately it’s still a bit trial and error even now. Most people tolerate fluoxetine, Prozac,” he clarified when Greg looked questioningly at him, “They just help to bring your neurotransmitter levels back up to a reasonable level which should mean that any ‘talk therapy’ has a better chance of working.” Again he looked at Greg and what he saw made him continue. “At the moment you’re in either a downward spiral or a holding pattern, you’re low on serotonin and that makes it hard to be realistic about yourself or your situation and then the negativity in turn reduces the production of serotonin and so on. What time of day are you best able to get things done?”

Mycroft was surprised at the question and he had to clamp down on the urge to answer it in Greg’s place, _when did I start doing that?_ he wondered as Greg replied,

“I suppose late on, when I’m not sleeping, I sometimes feel like I should just live at the other end of the day, work at night, sleep later.”

“Yeah, that’s not just the insomnia; it’s that your neurotransmitters build up during the day to a decent level by bedtime.” 

John sat up straighter before he carried on, and Mycroft was aware of John suddenly going into ‘doctor’ mode, it wasn’t quite the first time he’d seen it, but it always surprised him, it was easy to take Sherlock’s stated valuation of John without reflecting on the fact that here was a man who had breezed through both medical school _and_ basic training.

“Yes, then I think if you’re willing to give it a go it might be a good idea to try fluoxetine, just bear in mind it can increase anxiety for a little while, you need to speak to me straight away if it’s a problem. I’ll write you a ‘scrip, start by taking one every other day for a week and then one a day, first thing in the morning. When will be the best time for you to see me regularly?”

It seemed that faced with making actual arrangements Greg was suddenly nervous and Mycroft guessed that it was suddenly all seeming far too real, that Greg was wrestling down the urge to claim that nothing was wrong, but he did speak in the end,

“How often?”

“Once a week?” John ventured, “I appreciate that things might come up for either of us with … work, but if we aim for that then see how we go?”

There was a long pause again while it seemed that Greg was considering the different options,

“Saturday morning?”

 

If he’d been asked Mycroft would have said that he expected that Greg would feel calmer once the decision had been made, once things were arranged with John and he had the prescription in his pocket, but he was forced to admit during the cab ride home that if anything Greg was more wound up, more stressed.

As the cab drew up to Greg’s building he almost leapt out, leaving Mycroft to settle up with the driver and was in the building and up the stairs before Mycroft even got the door open. By the time Mycroft actually got into the flat, Greg was in the bedroom and he was unsurprised to find that he was getting dressed for work.

“I don’t suppose there’s anything I can say to persuade you not to go to work, is there?”

Greg’s reply was unequivocal,

“No.”

For a second or two Mycroft considered having the argument but knew that he wouldn’t win,

“Very well, I’ll put together some food we can eat cold when you’re home. I may as well check in at the office myself,”

Greg interrupted, his voice muffled for a second as he pulled a plain white shirt over his head,

“Don’t worry about it, I’ll be late, I need to make up my hours.”

Mycroft took a deep but soundless breath, refrained from telling Greg that he was talking rubbish and contented himself with restating that he would leave food ready, to which Greg responded with a terse ‘OK’ before he hurried out. Mycroft noted that Greg hadn’t once met his eye since they’d left Baker Street.

 

Mycroft hoped that no one at work noticed if he was a little less than focused during the course of the late afternoon and early evening. Mycroft had always been aware that it was vitally important that the work did not rely completely on him; if something happened to him then things had to go on as if he’d never been there. On a personal level it meant that he could take most of a day off with a surety that things would get done, on an impersonal level, if he were to die, whether by natural or unnatural causes, then disruption would be minor. So it came as no surprise that things had continued to run smoothly. The late afternoon passed in small meetings with members of his staff and the evening in reading transcripts and précis produced by various teams around the world. The world continued to turn evenly, things were as expected. It gave him a quiet satisfaction that this was the case, that the things he had nudged or tweaked had stayed nudged and with that thought he left to return to what he was rapidly beginning to think of as their flat.

 

Greg was not there. Mycroft hadn’t expected that he would be but it was still a disappointment on some level. Going into the bedroom he quickly changed into less formal clothes and rolled his sleeves ready to cook something that would survive being left in the fridge for an indeterminate amount of time. The kitchen was well appointed, it had surprised him the first time he’d been there, but then Greg had been fending for himself since he was eighteen, if he hadn’t learned to cook a diet of takeaways would probably have killed him by now, Mycroft mused. In the end he decided to curry some vegetables and make the result into small, easy to eat tarts, the sort of thing that Greg could grab two or three of and get some nourishment and anyway Mycroft liked making pastry. He’d made something similar the first time he’d cooked for Greg, and the recollection of that evening brought a reminiscent smile which quickly becomes rueful, things were, at least comparatively, so much easier then.

 

It isn’t often that Mycroft is not in control of his thoughts but tonight is one of those times and he breathes a hopeless sigh as he throws the second lot of ruined pastry into the bin and reaches for the flour. _This is ridiculous_ , he thinks, _nothing about this recipe is difficult and I’ve made it many times before_ , and he forces himself to focus on the butter and the flour and on the ‘breadcrumbs’ made as he rubs the one into the other with light finger-tips. This time, it comes together like a dream with a minimum of ice cold water and this time when he breathes a sigh, it is a sigh of relief before he reaches for a sharp knife and begins to trim a variety of vegetables into uniform pieces.

Mycroft is tasting the delicately but warmly spiced mixture when he hears the knock at the door. He has stood all his security down, or stood them down as far as is possible (not that far, but he hopes it will be enough to not scare Greg away) wanting tonight to be as normal as possible. With the noise the nerves that he’s been keeping at bay arrive in full force and a dozen what-ifs assail him, the chief of which is ‘What if it was just a spur of the moment thing that he’s regretted ever since and he’s just too polite to tell me so?’. He puts the spoon back down on the counter and pulls the pan off the gas before wiping his hands and going to let the man in.

“Good evening,” he says, smiling in a way that he’s convinced is inane as he opens the door. He’s horribly aware of how nervous he is for something that’s supposed to be just a ‘thank you’ dinner. Greg manages a much more casual ‘Hiya’ that makes Mycroft feel just that little bit worse and Mycroft almost doesn’t hear his next words,

“I brought some wine. Wasn’t sure I should, you’ve probably known more about wine since you were ten than I know now, but here it is.”

Mycroft’s mind goes completely blank as he automatically takes the bottle. Greg is wearing a denim jacket and a white t-shirt and Mycroft finds the sight, combined with spiked hair and with definite stubble removes all of his ability to think and he can’t help but stare. When, after several ages of man, he finally manages words, they are inane and he hastily covers up by offering to take Lestrade’s jacket and he can’t quite help slightly hugging the warm fabric to himself before he turns to hang it up. When he turns back it’s to see Greg grinning at him, and he immediately goes into social, superficial mode, falling back on rote to cover up for the horrible feeling that Greg is laughing at him,

“I’m sure the wine will be lovely, come into the kitchen, I just need to do some finishing off.” Mycroft is slightly proud of the urbane tone he manages, but Greg doesn’t follow him, he reaches out a hand to grasp at his upper arm, so that all Mycroft can do is turn to face him, looking down at the floor between them before looking further away,

“What’s the matter?” Greg asks,

“Nothing, nothing at all, what makes you think that there’s something amiss?” 

Greg doesn’t reply he just reaches up and gently turns Mycroft’s head towards him and Mycroft allows himself to look directly at him. What he sees is so warm that this time there is no mistaking the expression for the sort of mockery he feels like he’s always experienced in social situations and he finds himself answering the question,

“When you smiled like that, I thought you were mocking me. I know you weren’t but,”

“But it’s what you expect from people. You won’t get it from me. When I smiled it was because I was just happy to be here with you.” 

Greg moved forward slightly at that and kissed him. It was a different kiss to the one they had shared at the hospital, less tentative, less unsure, more a promise than an offer. When Greg drew back again, Mycroft spoke,

“I should make sure that nothing is going to burn,”

“Yeah, you should, is there anything that can’t wait for a bit?” and Greg was back to the grin that teetered on the edge of becoming a leer.

“Nothing that I can’t put to one side,” Mycroft replied,

“Then in that case I think you should give me the tour, finishing up with the bedroom, actually I think we could start with the bedroom as well!”

Mycroft is shocked; he’s never met anyone so forthright, well not about him anyway. It seems that Greg can read that from his usually unrevealing face,

“Sorry, too much? Not interested? Sorry, I thought after…”

Mycroft is surprised to see a faint blush on him and an isolated part of his brain idly thinks how much it suits him, but mainly he wants Greg to stop apologising, and feeling more nervous than he can remember, he reaches a hand up to the back of Greg’s neck and pulls him into a kiss. It’s part reassurance and part desire and certainly a desire that Greg shouldn’t apologise for feeling like that about him. 

When they break apart Greg leans his head on Mycroft’s shoulder for a moment before Mycroft speaks,

“Does that still answer your question? Because if it does then I’ll just take some things out of the oven and then, I’ll give you that tour.”

“Among other things?” Greg asks, the slight leer making a reappearance,

“Definitely among other things.” Mycroft replies with a wholly unaccustomed grin.

 

The thought that this isn’t the same keeps going through Mycroft’s mind. There is no fear and he’d expected there would be, there are no apologies and he’d expected to have to make those as well. There is no taking which is probably the most difficult thing to get used to; there is no taking only a free giving from both of them. Greg seems to just know that he needs to be careful with Mycroft and the explanations and excuses that Mycroft expected to have to make just evaporate as Greg’s lips move onto his throat and then he feels the first scrape of teeth and suction at a level where only he will see any mark left, so not like Graham.

“You’re thinking too much,” Greg murmurs, his lips millimetres away from Mycroft’s collar bone, “be in the moment,” he continues and then his hand strays down so that his fingers are just ever so slightly below the waistband of Mycroft’s trousers and when Greg begins to gently pull at the line of dark hair he finds there Mycroft stops thinking altogether.

_And this is the best bit_ , Mycroft thinks as he lies in Greg’s arms afterwards. He can’t quite categorise how he’s feeling. Certainly fulfilled as he has never been before, accepted would be another suitable word and a quiet inner voice that he would listen to at work whispers _‘loved’_ as Greg pulls him even closer.

 

And of course it had been love, Mycroft was sure of that now, surer than he’d been of anything for years. The recollection left him half hard but it also left him with a course of action. Greg needed to feel what Mycroft had felt that first night. He went back to his cooking with precision and concentration and when the small vegetable tarts were cooling he carefully prepared a salad and plated the whole lot up as carefully as he could, trying to make the whole thing light and appetising, hoping that Greg would be tempted. Finally he covered the food carefully and put it in the fridge, before going back into the living room to read, if he could concentrate, and to wait for Greg.

 

It was going up for midnight by the time Mycroft heard Greg’s keys in the lock and he got up to let him in. He looked knackered and after a quick glance he failed to meet Mycroft’s eyes,

“Oh, you’re still up,” and then still without meeting Mycroft’s eyes, “I did tell you I’d be late.”

“Yes, you did, but I very much wanted to see you. I always do, you know.” Greg ducked his head and didn’t reply and for a moment Mycroft almost left it at that as Greg went to move past him but he made himself stick to his resolve and shifted slightly so that Greg couldn’t get past him without actually walking into him. Mycroft reached for him and Greg stopped moving but without any change of posture, waiting. The urge to apologise and get out of his way was almost overwhelming for Mycroft, _but I’ve been doing that too much,_ he thought, instead he continued to speak, “I don’t think I tell you often enough how much I love you, how much you changed my life for the better, I don’t think I knew what it was to love or be loved before you.”

For a moment Mycroft could feel Greg tense up before he slumped, and at that Mycroft moved one more step towards him and put his arms around him, holding him tight. When Greg finally spoke his words were muffled by his jacket and Mycroft’s sweater,

“Really?”

“Of course ‘really’.”

“Even though I’m broken?”

“Not broken, my heart, just damaged and even then you’re mending.”

There was a long pause before Greg spoke again,

“Really?”

Mycroft held him more tightly,

“Really.”

 

DI Reedley hardly ever carried out ‘dawn raids’ but for Madder she’d decided to make an exception; she wanted him completely disoriented and as scared and worried as possible. She was sure that he would admit to it and reasonably sure that he would give up his ‘friends’ but there was nothing wrong with making sure. So here she was at 0545 round the corner with two of her team and four burly blokes from the Specialist Entry Team.

“Right,” she said, quietly, “this is nothing complicated; I want to scare the little bastard shitless. According to the electoral register and the council tax rolls he’s the only one who lives there, so we shouldn’t have to deal with screeching kids or a distraught wife.”

This instruction was received with a brief grin from the sergeant from the entry team,

“So we shouldn’t be looking particularly hard to minimise damage?”

“I don’t think we’re going to have to pay for any damage, it’s definitely him, DNA doesn’t lie, and you put that with the drink tampering and I’m as near to certain as I’ve ever been that we’ve got the right person.”

“Yeah,” he agreed, “we know which case this is connected with, and I think we can manage to scare him for you without overstepping the mark.” Deb wondered not for the first time about the degree of gossip that went on in the police. She supposed that she should talk to her team about it but it could have come from anywhere, news like that seemed to get about by osmosis. She took a deep breath and cleared that issue from her mind, “Are we ready?”

“We certainly are.”

 

The raid went like clockwork. Madder had indeed been home asleep alone and had indeed been scared and disoriented by someone beating his door open with a battering ram. Deb had followed that up with leaving him in an interview room to stew with an impassive, silent and very, very large constable. Having spoken to him before, she was working under the impression that this would be more effective than a cell where he could pace or otherwise distract himself. After half an hour, Deb entered the interview room.

“Good morning, Mr Madder,”

“What’s all this about?”

“As you were told, you were arrested for a serious sexual assault.”

“That’s sh…rubbish, I never did anything to that bloke, you can ask him, I should have brought charges against that other guy…”

“Sorry, did we not make ourselves clear? This arrest is not in connection with the incident in the bar, this arrest is in connection with a serious sexual assault carried out in an alley off King Street in March.”

Part of Deb felt that she shouldn’t really be pleased by his reaction, the draining of colour from his face but it was hard not to,

“I’ve never been there!”

“Then I’m sure you’ll be interested to hear that we found a droplet of your semen in that alley? What is it Mr Madder? Do you only like to watch?”

Deb saw a brief expression of anger cross his face before he slumped back against the chair,

“I want a solicitor.”

 

He folded just as quickly as Deb had expected he would. After a fifteen minute discussion with the duty solicitor he seemed to have accepted that the truth was his best bet. It was of course not his fault; that had been predictable; it had been the other blokes, Stinson’s idea in particular. The pleading tone in his voice, the fact that he seemed almost to be trying to get Deb to agree that it wasn’t his fault was hard to take but as she had done many times, she gently played along in order to ensure that he gave her the full information about the others. She clarified each piece of information as she went, and the duty solicitor raised no objections to any of it.

“So, Mr Madder, is there anything else you want to add?”

He glanced round and seemed to take in his situation anew,

“This is going to be serious isn’t it?”

“Very much so, I’m not completely sure what charges we will make, not until I’ve spoken to the CPS but, it could go as high as a rape charge.”

There was a long silence before Madder spoke again,

“That’s life, isn’t it?”

“Yes.”

“And they’ll know? I mean they’ll know that I talked?”

Deb paused for a moment, a moment to think about the wreck, temporarily she hoped, that this man and his friends had made of Greg Lestrade and god knows how many others’ lives and declined to try and reassure him,

“Yes, of course they will.”

It worried Deb just a little that she felt a vindictive surge of pleasure as he went pale.


	9. Chapter 9

When the phone rang right in the middle of the supper Mycroft had prepared he narrowly managed to avoid sighing, but Greg would not be Greg if he could ignore that kind of thing,

“It’s work,” he said, getting up and answering, “yes?”

Mycroft closely watched Greg as he listened to whoever had called. At first he went pale and then slowly flushed as his face completely lost all expression. Finally he turned away and began to speak, replying to questions or comments, his voice almost toneless,

“No, don’t worry we weren’t in bed yet … So, do I need to do anything? … No, I suppose not … Hadn’t even thought about bail … no different, I guess … No, I know you can’t … thanks for letting me know … thanks.”

Part of Mycroft’s mind was aware that normally he would have been able to make a good guess as to the other side of the conversation but for some reason he couldn’t at this point, his mind was like it was filled with white noise, all he could do was to wait for Greg to turn back to him, wait for Greg to speak.

Greg switched off the phone, actually switched it off Mycroft noted, and put it in his hip pocket before visibly pulling himself together and turning back towards the table and Mycroft,

“That was Deb Reedley,” he said, pausing to run one hand through his short hair, “they’ve caught them.”

Mycroft was frozen in place unable to interpret the expression on Greg’s face, but he knew he had to speak,

“Are they sure?”

“Seem to be,” Greg replied, “Didn’t ask if it was the people you and John and Sherlock found or the guy that your lot found but…”

“It probably is,” Mycroft said, “I wonder how they finally caught them?”

“You mean you don’t know?”

It seemed like a genuine question, not one asked with any side, and Mycroft answered it as such,

“No, I have not kept an eye on the investigation; I was as surprised by this as you were.”

Greg turned slightly so that he was facing Mycroft more square on and looked him directly in the eye,

“Thank you. That must have been hard.”

Mycroft annoyingly felt himself blush,

“Not in comparison, but yes, it was a temptation.” 

Unsure whether it was appropriate or not Mycroft began to smile and a moment later he saw the same tentative expression begin to form on Greg’s face. With no further thought he stood up and stepped towards Greg, walking into his now open arms. For the first time in what seemed like forever Greg kissed him without any apparent thought beyond the desire to kiss him.

When they finally pull apart, the grin returned quickly to Greg’s face,

“They’ve bloody got them!”

And though a thousand doubts were suddenly assailing Mycroft, he returned the grin and then the kiss.

 

 _Well if the news has been good for nothing it’s been good for a decent night’s sleep_ , Mycroft mused as he lay in the early morning sunlight, arm trapped under a still snoring Greg. Greg’s euphoria that the end was in sight had meant that he had dropped off quickly; Mycroft had not slept as well. As soon as Greg was asleep the doubts and worries that he’d kept a lid on for Greg’s sake had emerged and paraded in front of him. The court case, the publicity, what would happen if they didn’t secure a conviction, how Greg was going to cope with it all and how the whole thing was going to affect Greg’s mental state. Normally Mycroft was able to discipline his thoughts and certainly to divide his worries into things he could do something about (worth worrying about) and things he couldn’t (not worth even thinking about once responses were formulated) but his thought processes through the night would best have been described as chaotic. And he was doing no better this morning. With an effort though he cleared his mind, the surest thing was that for Greg’s sake he would need to be reactive instead of proactive for once. 

It seemed like the thought had woken Greg who began to stir almost immediately, rolling off Mycroft’s arm and stretching,

“Morning,” he smiled, “feel like I’ve slept for hours!”

“That’s because you have; do you feel better for it?”

“Feel better for something,” he replied, rolling back again and kissing Mycroft’s shoulder, before moving across and kissing the hollow between his collar bones and starting to move down his breast bone. It was the most ‘interest’ Greg had shown since the rape, but it seemed like the thought had occurred to them both at the same time and Greg sat up. Mycroft smiled at him but Greg looked frustrated with himself, “Sorry, My,”

“You have nothing to be sorry for, that was a lovely way to start the day.” Mycroft was being completely truthful but Greg seemed to doubt him,

“If you say so,” he replied and then paused before continuing in a rush, “I am trying you know?”

“I do know and you don’t need to try.”

Greg looked at him with a raised eyebrow,

“What I mean is,” Mycroft said, “that what we have now is wonderful, I love you, it’s not about sex, it’s about you and I will be waiting when and if you want more but if you never do, I will still love you.”

For a second all the fight seemed to go out of Greg and he looked at Mycroft with everything to be read in his eyes, the doubt and the worry, but also the determination, then he squared his shoulders and sat up straighter before he spoke,

“They won’t win, not on any of this, I promise.”

“I know, but we have the rest of our lives, we can take our time.”

“So, what happens now?”

Mycroft knew that he could look this up, knew that he had staff who could give him a breakdown of the likely course of the case but when he had determined to step out of the situation he had made a promise to himself to do it properly. 

Greg managed a smile of sorts,

“Not much, really. Deb didn’t think she’d get a remand in custody, but she’ll probably get bail conditions that keep the lot of them indoors at night. The only thing that happens now is that she and her team put together a case and pass it to the CPS who decide whether to prosecute.”

That was a thought that for whatever reason hadn’t occurred to Mycroft,

“Is it likely that they wouldn’t prosecute?”

“Not very likely, but it does sometimes happen. The DNA is pretty conclusive but only for the one guy who has then given up his ‘friends’. If the CPS thinks he isn’t or won’t be a convincing witness then they might just prosecute him.” Greg caught the tail of Mycroft’s outraged expression and gave a rueful grin, “It’s all a matter of cost-benefit, no use ploughing a lot of resource into a case that isn’t likely to get a conviction, better to spend that money ensuring that safer convictions are made.”

“That’s ridiculous!”

“Sort of,” Greg agreed, “but, you know, in these austere days,” Greg’s smile faded when he saw Mycroft’s face, “It’s just the way it is My, and no, before you ask I don’t want you to lean on anyone to sort it out, it will be what it will be, if we don’t get them for this, we’ll get them for something else. Like I said, nothing much will happen for some time whatever happens.”

“Will you see them?” Mycroft asked,

“No, I’m sure Deb would let me but no, I’m going to try and behave like I’m not an officer for this. We just need to bide ourselves in patience. Do you want to see them, do you feel like it would give you some closure?”

Mycroft thought for a moment, his first reaction was that he did, but he’d got himself into trouble with things like this before,

“No, as you say, the law should take its course, time enough at the trial.”

 

At supper some days later Greg was opening his mail as he distractedly ate a microwave lasagne. It had been a busy day or two, for which Mycroft knew that Greg had been glad, not that he wanted a series of aggravated burglaries to happen, but if they had to happen then the timing had been good, stopped him from obsessing too much about bail hearings and the like. He wrestled open the last letter one-handed and Mycroft just had time to see that it was NHS before Greg dropped his fork and took it properly out of its envelope. It took a very great effort for Mycroft to continue to eat the suddenly like ashes food as he waited. Finally Greg put down the letter,

“That’s the reminder from the STI clinic to come in for the final test.”

Mycroft had no idea what to say,

“Oh.” Many things that he could say went through his mind, before he finally selected the most neutral, “When?”

“Thursday. I’ll go in the morning on the way to work.”

“Do you want me to come with you?”

“No point,” Greg replied with a smile which faded a little before he spoke again, “wouldn’t mind you coming with me to get the results, Friday morning?”

“I’ll let my people know that I won’t be in that morning.”

“That might be a bit over the top,” Greg said,

“I don’t think so,” Mycroft said, “either it will be good news in which case I think we should do something to celebrate even if it’s only have a good breakfast, or,”

“Or,” Greg interrupted, “we’ll need to make plans, get you tested, find out about medication … I know we haven’t done anything which might have passed anything on to you, but I’ll admit it’s been worrying me.”

“We’ve been careful, and we don’t know you’ve caught anything,” he reached across the table and gently grasped Greg’s hand, the texture of his skin familiar and a comfort, “everything will be fine.”

“And if it isn’t? I won’t stay with you if I’m infected, it wouldn’t be fair.”

Mycroft wanted to argue, wanted to spit and swear but the look on Greg’s face, the determination made him restrain himself,

“Time enough to worry about that on Friday morning.”

“I won’t change my mind.”

“And neither will I, but as I said there’s time enough to discuss it on Friday morning.”

Greg didn’t make any further comment but settled instead for looking mutinous. _Not a good start to the evening_ , Mycroft thought and he found himself coming back to the conversation all through the evening. In the end, after he’d read the same sentence for the third time and still couldn’t have told what it said, he decided that it would be less disruptive to have the conversation than to be constantly stopping himself on the edge of saying something,

“Greg?”

Greg put down his book and looked directly at Mycroft, a definite wariness in his expression,

“Are you sure this is a conversation that we should have right now?”

“Anything but,” Mycroft said, “but I find I can’t leave it alone. I need you to realise that I won’t leave you whatever happens.”

“You’ve never really been ‘out’ as such, have you?”

“No, I suppose not,” Mycroft replied, knowing that his confusion was showing clearly on his face.

“I’ve been sort of ‘semi-out’ for years and AIDS was just initially hitting when I was growing up. I’ve watched people die, before there was medication, even before people really knew what caused it. It’s horrible, a truly bloody awful way to go and I won’t let you put yourself through that. If,” he swallowed, “if the results come back positive then…” Greg stopped speaking and for a few seconds Mycroft waited for him to continue before it became clear that he wasn’t going to. Mycroft took a further few seconds to formulate what he was going to say,

“I had an uncle who died of cancer when I was about nine. It’s strange to think that Sherlock won’t even remember him. Back then palliative care wasn’t what it is now and he died in a great deal of pain. I don’t actually know what particular type of cancer it was, in the end it had spread to so many different tissues that it didn’t matter. His wife stayed with him to the end. At the end he couldn’t see properly but he could still hear. My overwhelming recollection is that her voice never wavered when she spoke to him even though she cried so much it was a wonder she didn’t dry up and blow away. Would you have said that she should have left him? And please do us both the favour of not trying to say that this is different, because it isn’t.”

Having said his piece Mycroft stopped speaking and waited for some response from Greg. It took some time but he was determined not to let Greg off the hook. Eventually he did speak,

“You’re right it is the same, but, do you think he wanted her there watching him … decay in front of her eyes? How did he feel? Did he get a say? For all we know he might have wanted her well out of it, wanted her to remember him as he was not as a cancer riddled husk. I’ll admit that at least part of how I feel about this is selfishness, selfishness and vanity.”

“Vanity? You?” Mycroft asked, incredulity clear in his voice. His tone brought the ghost of a smile to Greg’s face,

“Yes, vanity, me! I know I’m not completely the stereotypical gay bloke, obsessed with how I look, constantly at the gym,” he looked directly at Mycroft, “putting product in my hair, but I do have some pride, you know.”

Mycroft had genuinely not considered that aspect of it and for a few seconds he did just that, considered it and then dismissed it,

“That would be a valid argument, if,” he raised a hand to forestall Greg’s comment, knowing it would annoy him, “there was still no effective treatment for HIV. It’s not like that now, you most likely wouldn’t get ‘ill’ as such. There would be no reason for you to fear for your vanity.”

As Mycroft had suspected he would, Greg took exception to this,

“I’m not thick, you know! I know the medication is better, but I’m not always in a position to be compliant with medication, it can’t have escaped your giant intellect that I don’t always work regular hours and,” 

Mycroft held his breath as Greg paused in what he was saying, but then he didn’t continue,

“And,” Mycroft prompted,

Greg stood up, taking a step towards the fireplace before turning to face Mycroft again,

“And there’s you. This isn’t my usual lack of self-esteem showing, I won’t risk you catching anything and I won’t ask you to take up a life of celibacy. You’ve had the world’s worst luck in relationships,”

“Until I met you,” Mycroft said,

“If you say so,” the reply came with a small smile before Greg continued, “you deserve the chance to be happy, to…”

Mycroft interrupted again,

“I will only be happy with you.”

“Don’t be daft,”

“I’m not, and I’m not even saying I won’t give myself the chance to be happy, I’m just saying that I can’t see how I’d be happy knowing that you were in the world and I wasn’t there with you. The idea that we could or would dwindle into acquaintances, saying ‘hello’ if we met in the street but then having nothing left to say,”

Mycroft would have carried on, but the look on Greg’s face as he heard the words, showed that he was actually envisaging that scenario and liking it no more than Mycroft did. Without thinking Mycroft stood and took the two steps necessary to pull Greg into his arms and kiss him.

It was an unguarded kiss with no thought behind it other than to remove the lost expression from Greg’s face. It quickly became passionate, almost a physical continuation of their argument, before Mycroft felt the fight go out of Greg, felt him relax and open up and like a light going on he realised what at least some of the problem was. He pulled away slightly, only so much as to open up a space into which he could speak,

“I love you, and whatever happens on Thursday morning we will deal with it together.”

 

“Well,” Greg said as they left the clinic on Friday morning, “I don’t know what to do now.”

Mycroft silently agreed with him,

“Let’s go home,” Mycroft suggested, “I’ll make us a proper breakfast.”

 

Mycroft went straight into the kitchen when they got back to Greg’s flat and busied himself with a frying pan and the eggs for an omelette without really getting any further forward, as he listened to Greg moving about in the other room. He knew that Greg would finally make his way into the kitchen, knew that they would both find it easier to talk if they were doing something. He wasn’t wrong, Greg finally came into the kitchen just as Mycroft was trying to decide between cheese, ham or cheese and ham.

“I don’t know what to do.” Greg repeated,

“I’d be surprised if you did,” Mycroft said, turning to face him, “how convinced have you been that you were going to die?”

He hadn’t intended to ask the question but looking at Greg and knowing that he was so horribly on edge had made him want to get the conversation going sooner rather than later. Greg opened his mouth to reply and then shut it again. When he finally managed to speak it was with a quirk of the lips that might generously have been described as a smile,

“Sometimes I hate that I’m so transparent to you.”

“You’re not,” Mycroft replied, “you are to a surprising degree not transparent to me.” He moved towards Greg, crowding into his personal space, “You I have to concentrate on and even then I so often get it wrong. You’re a constant, wonderful surprise to me. It’s one of the several reasons I love you.”

“I love you too,” he replied and he moved forward and kissed Mycroft, a chaste kiss but on the lips, “Yeah, I suppose I have been thinking that.”

Mycroft was surprised that Greg had admitted the feeling so easily and possibly more surprised that something stopped Greg from actually saying the words.

“And so now,” he replied, returning the kiss, “you have to decide what happens next when you haven’t even been allowing yourself to think there would be a ‘next’?”

He asked it as a question but in truth it wasn’t one. He’d caught himself thinking the same thing a couple of times, not explicitly, but more a feeling that they were both waiting before they got on with dealing with the diagnosis. Greg nodded,

“It’s a really weird feeling, like I’ve been given something back, but really it turns out it was never taken away in the first place.” He looked around the room before he spoke again, “I think what I’d really like would be for you to take me to bed.” Mycroft was astonished and elated and just slightly concerned that Greg was trying to take things too quickly. Apparently Greg could read this from his face, “Don’t worry, I’m sure I’ll be fine, it isn’t like I have any real memories of what happened,” he swallowed, “when I thought I might have caught something one of the things that stuck in my mind was the idea that, that, what happened, might be the last time, that I might not …”

Mycroft took pity on him struggling as he was to put words round what it was he was feeling,

“It wouldn’t have mattered, I can be incredibly persistent when I’m that side out, I would have worn you down, eventually.”

Greg started to answer but abruptly seemed to change his mind, deciding Mycroft thought that the argument would be pointless. Instead he kissed Mycroft, kissed him with what Mycroft felt was serious intent, before pulling away slightly and speaking in a very low voice as his hand strayed down to cup Mycroft’s hardening cock, “Whatever. Now what I would really like is for you to take me to bed and fuck me until I can’t walk straight. Would that be all right?”

Mycroft didn’t answer he just turned and pulled Greg by the hand towards the bedroom.


	10. Chapter 10

_Not an unqualified success_ , Mycroft thought with typical understatement as he lay in bed curled protectively around Greg as he dozed in the aftermath. Mycroft had thought that Greg was perhaps trying too hard after they’d got the results of the second test and so it had been. Greg’s original idea had foundered on the fact that there was no way that he could relax enough for it to be a possibility and truth to tell it had been a relief to Mycroft since he knew that any perceived ‘lack of enthusiasm’ on his part would have been interpreted as rejection. Greg had of course blamed himself and it had taken a lot of work from Mycroft to persuade him that this wasn’t the case and just purely being able to touch Greg in that way again was enough. In the end they’d realised that they were both too keyed up for anything in the least acrobatic and he and Greg had taken each other in hand and it had been … lovely, loving and quiet and satisfying and lovely. 

Lovely, but not what Greg had at least _thought_ he wanted. Mycroft sighed. It wasn’t that he hadn’t understood Greg’s sentiment and part of him had also wanted it but another part of him couldn’t completely separate what those animals had done from what Greg wanted him to do. Greg, apparently, still had no clear recognition of what had happened and because of that and because Greg didn’t want him involved with the investigation Mycroft also had no idea. As a consequence, in his sleepless hours, and there had been a lot of them, he had found himself imagining a hundred different atrocities, to the point where they were all he could see when he tried to imagine him and Greg together: some days it seemed like it was slowly driving him to bedlam. And now, with the results of the tests, he had to find some way of not letting this be the rock on which the two of them foundered, because for the life in him he couldn’t see how he could talk about this without it seeming like victim-blaming.

_Still we took the first step_ , he thought, _and I really ought to wake him, if he intends to show his face at work this afternoon_ ,

“Greg?”

There was no response except for a tightening of the hold Greg had on Mycroft’s arm. Mycroft tried again,

“Do you want me to ‘ring you in’? If not, you’re going to have to get up, love.”

For a moment the only response was a deep, deep sigh before Greg abruptly sat up,

“I suppose I ought to go, Sally at least will have had some idea what this morning was about, if I ring in sick, she’ll only think the worst and we’ll have her here being solicitous,”

“While I’m always happy to see Sergeant Donovan,” Mycroft replied with a smile, “I don’t think it would be quite fair, “ 

Greg looked at him over his shoulder, returning a half-hearted smile, holding Mycroft’s gaze for a long, long moment, leaving Mycroft feeling like he was being minutely examined,

“I suppose not,” he agreed, finally, but instead of getting up he flopped back onto the bed and pulled Mycroft’s arm round himself, as if he was trying to recapture the feeling instead of moving. Mycroft could feel that Greg was tensing up again and pulled him closer so that he was in as much skin to skin contact as he could achieve. Greg tensed even more for a second before he sighed and relaxed, “It’s not over, is it?” he asked.

Mycroft waited a moment or two before he replied,

“No, and I’m sorry for that, my heart, but it’s a couple of good steps closer to over, the tests and working with John, they are,” he paused, “what we need to do to finish this thing. And it’s not just us, there’s what DI Reedley is doing, there will be what the CPS do and lots more, they are all the necessary steps.”

Greg lay still for a while and Mycroft wondered if he had drifted back to sleep, so that in the end when Greg spoke Mycroft was startled,

“And what about you?”

Mycroft was confused by the question, he couldn’t work out what Greg was asking him and Greg seemed to guess that this was the case because after a moment he continued to speak, “I mean, what steps do you need to take?”

Still tightly wrapped around Greg Mycroft gazed at the flecks of dust caught in the narrow strip of sunlight from between the almost drawn curtains, desperate for any distraction, but gradually he felt the tension coming back into Greg’s muscles, in the grip he had on Mycroft’s arm and he knew he had to speak even though he was still not sure or not letting himself be sure what he was being asked. Greg beat him to it though, before he could get any words out, “I’m not getting at you, but … you aren’t … you don’t … you don’t look at me like you used to.” When he finished speaking Greg was breathing hard and his grip on Mycroft’s arm was tight enough to be painful. 

Mycroft knew or thought at least that he could guess what Greg’s next words would be and he had to speak before Greg, even if he had no idea what to say,

“I’m sorry.”

“So I haven’t been imagining it? I really find it hard to tell these days, what’s real and what’s just my paranoia.”

“I don’t feel any different about you, honestly,” Mycroft stuttered out, “I love you more than I’ve ever loved anyone,”

Greg interrupted,

“But you don’t want me.”

“Of course I do!”

Greg didn’t move, didn’t slacken his hold on Mycroft’s arm and Mycroft lay there with him, a thousand different continuations of his statement flittering through his mind only to be dismissed for a hundred different reasons. In the end it was Greg who spoke again,

“I know you love me, I wouldn’t want you to think that I doubt that but,” he paused and sighed, not Mycroft thought in irritation, more like he couldn’t find the right words, “like I said you don’t look at me the same.”

Mycroft knew he had to speak before this got any worse,

“You’re right, but it’s me not you,” Greg gave a brief huff of laughter but Mycroft didn’t let him interrupt, “I haven’t known how to say this so that it didn’t sound like I was saying it was your fault, but when I think about ... what you suggested before then I am constantly asking myself ‘how am I different from those animals?’”

For ten heartbeats Greg didn’t move, didn’t react at all except to take one deep breath. Mycroft found that he couldn’t breathe, couldn’t work out how Greg was going to react, if he was going to react, so that when Greg let go of his arm it almost startled him. Greg sat up and Mycroft was sure that he was going to get up and probably leave but instead he merely turned over so that he was facing Mycroft, able to look directly into his eyes,

“That first night we shared a bed again, you were worried then that I might think you were angling for sex, weren’t you?”

Mycroft had to think for a moment but then he recalled that brief fragment of conversation,

“Yes.” There were so many other words he wanted to say but he feared to say them, feared to make it worse. Greg took a deep breath and Mycroft restrained himself from any reaction that could be seen as bracing himself as he waited for Greg to speak,

“And there, that’s the difference. You waited until you were asked, you worried about this, but now you need, we both need for you to really believe that you’re not the same as them.”

Greg leaned forward ever so slightly, still holding Mycroft’s gaze until the last moment and kissed him slowly and deliberately. Mycroft closed his eyes and deliberately refused to think, trying to stay just in that sweet moment until Greg pulled away slightly and continued speaking, with a slight smile,

“So I ask again, Mr Holmes, what do _you_ need to do?”

Mycroft swallowed,

“I need to talk to someone.”

Greg kissed him again.

 

The problem was, who could Mycroft Holmes ‘talk to’? This question occupied Mycroft’s still moments for the rest of the day. Mycroft knew things. Mycroft knew a lot of things. If his enemies, or worse still his superiors got wind of him ‘talking to someone’ then that could be the beginning of the end of what he did. Years ago when he’d said to John Watson that he occupied ‘a minor role in government’, he’d been accurate in some ways. If you looked at a structure chart of the department he worked for it would show him as the high end of mid-level and that was certainly how Mycroft wanted it to stay. But if you tried to show in a similar chart his actual position and influence then it would be like one of those ‘first signs of madness’ nests of string and paper and post-it notes that characters on television created and even then it wouldn’t show the half of it.

Many of those connections were grateful for one or more of the many favours Mycroft had done for people, for the quiet word which had alerted them to something that would have resulted in career disaster if they had continued not to see it. Some of them however still smarted from Mycroft dealing with something or otherwise showing them up and some few more actively resented his influence and knowledge and would hug themselves in delight at being able to set rumours of mental instability running through the networks of influence and favours. 

Which left him with two choices, John or Sherlock, neither of which delighted him for very different reasons. John because there would be or could be a conflict of interest and Mycroft would hate to do anything that might make Greg’s therapy less effective, and Sherlock because, while Sherlock’s analytical processes might enable him to cut to the core of what was going on, there would be no softening of any blows, no hiding any thought and in the final analysis he realised that was the point of the thing. The remaining question was whether Sherlock would cooperate.

 

Greg was up and out of bed early on Saturday morning even though he wasn’t due to see John until ten thirty. He was clearly very nervous about the whole thing and just as clearly he was trying not to let it show. By the time Mycroft followed him into the kitchen Greg was mixing batter by hand with the intention of cooking pancakes. Privately Mycroft thought that he’d rather eat ground glass, but be wasn’t going to tell Greg that,

“I’m doing pancakes,” Greg said unnecessarily, “you want some?”

“Just one, thanks,” Mycroft replied patting his stomach and smiling,

Greg returned his smile,

“Watching the waist-line, eh? You don’t need to on my account, I think I’d quite like the idea of a bit more of you around.”

“You might, but can you imagine what Sherlock was like when I was at my largest?” Mycroft tried to keep the tone light but he wasn’t sure he’d managed, and Greg’s next comment confirmed that,

“Was he awful about it?”

“Let’s just say that he used his considerable observational skills to find the exact things to say that were going to have the greatest effect.”

“I’m sorry about that,” Greg replied, “Should I kick him for you if I see him this morning?” It was said with a smile but Mycroft wondered how much Greg actually meant it. Better to let him know what he’d decided sooner rather than later,

“Actually I’ll be seeing him myself this morning.”

Greg put the bowl down and turned to look at him, slightly startled for a second or two before it dawned on him what Mycroft had decided,

“Do you really think that’s a good idea, is he not too close and, you know, too … Sherlock?”

Mycroft acknowledged that with a smile and moved so that he was stood next to Greg leaning on the worksurface,

“I think ‘too Sherlock’ is really the worry but seriously, you were right I need to talk this through and there are a limited number of people I can discuss this with; you’re talking to one of them and I don’t think that Anthea could be objective enough.”

“You’ve got me there, Sherlock will be objective, not to mention cutting, sarcastic and disparaging and that’s only if he’s in a good mood.” Greg turned to face him, “Seriously, My, I wouldn’t want you to put yourself through that, we can work it out, I’m sure we can.”

“No, you were right, I do need to make some efforts as well,”

Greg interrupted,

“You know it wasn’t that I thought you ought to be making an effort because I was, don’t you?”

Mycroft smiled and leaned in gently to kiss the corner of Greg’s mouth, before turning to lean back on the counter,

“Of course I do. But this has, I think stirred up some issues, and I do need to deal with them.”

“And you really think that Sherlock is the right person to help you with that? Do you even think that he will?”

Mycroft thought for a moment,

“Perhaps not, but I think he will. He really is very fond of you.”

“And not fond of you?” Greg asked,

“No, that’s not what I meant. I came to terms with Sherlock’s view of me a long time ago,” Mycroft stifled a sigh, “Whilst it wouldn’t be accurate to say ‘he doesn’t mean it,’ he certainly doesn’t mean it all how it sometimes comes out.”

Greg looked at him with one eyebrow raised before turning to the stove and busying himself with frying pan and batter. Mycroft contemplated trying to make him understand but decided against it, realising that Greg had probably spent more time with Sherlock in the last five years than he had and he kept going back despite what Sherlock said. If he didn’t understand how it was with his little brother he probably never would.

 

It felt beyond peculiar for both of them to be going to Baker Street together. It might have been enough to make them both nervous anyway but Mycroft was of the opinion that they were definitely making each other worse.

Mrs Hudson opened the door, neither of them felt quite right just walking in,

“Oh, hello dears, we don’t often see both of you here, in fact we don’t often see you here at all Mycroft.”

It was said with a smile, but Mycroft was more than aware that Mrs Hudson didn’t entirely approve of him, not for the first time he wondered if it was because she had had hopes that Sherlock and Greg would get together.

Mycroft smiled faintly, Mrs Hudson could spot a fake smile a mile off; under that ditzy façade she was incredibly sharp, 

“Greg’s here to talk to Dr Watson, and I’m here to get my brother out of their hair.”

Mrs Hudson looked from one to the other and draws her conclusions,

“I’ve been wondering how you were, Detective Inspector, I think it’ll do you good to talk to someone. He’s a very good listener John is.”

“I’m fine, thanks for asking,” Greg replied, “we’ll just go up?”

Mrs Hudson didn’t miss how little Greg wanted to talk about any of it and replied breezily,

“Oh, yes, sorry, I’m sure they’re both expecting you, at least Dr Watson is,” there was an infinitesimal pause, “not so sure about Sherlock.”

 

It had taken a little bit of persuasion to get Sherlock out of the flat, but not enough that Mycroft wasn’t aware that John had already told him he would need to be out of the way while he talked to Greg. Eventually, the two of them found themselves strolling along the paths of Regent’s park, silently. Faced with starting the conversation it seemed to Mycroft that all the words he knew had had their meaning surgically removed. In the end it was Sherlock who broke the silence.

“Well, Mycroft, you must have some reason for dragging me out ‘for a walk’, it’s been a long time since you wanted to spend ‘quality time’ with me.”

Two lots of implied quote marks in one sentence, Mycroft noted, this was not going to be an easy conversation, but it wasn’t even going to be a conversation if he didn’t get started. For a moment Mycroft was going to respond to the barb about spending quality time with Sherlock but after a second he recognised it as the distraction, the opened escape door that Sherlock had for once offered him. He was touched but he really did need to talk to someone about all of this,

“Yes. I need to talk to someone about … everything and I would like if you’re agreeable for that someone to be you.”

Sherlock was surprised Mycroft knew, there was an almost imperceptible halt in Sherlock’s pace and then another three steps before he actually replied, 

“When you say ‘about … everything,’ I am right in assuming you mean ‘about you and Lestrade’.”

“Yes.”

They continued to walk for another ten, twenty yards, Mycroft couldn’t frame the words to talk about the problem and as they walked in silence he hoped that Sherlock would say something to carry him over the break. In the end he did,

“You know when you first got involved with Lestrade you needed to convince yourself that he wasn’t Graham, and now you need to convince yourself that you aren’t.”


	11. Chapter 11

It was very obvious very quickly why Sherlock was both an awful choice as a therapist and the only choice that would have worked for him. He would not let anything go and even when Mycroft thought he’d got away with something Sherlock had merely parked whatever it was so that he could do it justice later. After the first of their “walks” Mycroft had had the overwhelming feeling that he’d been wrung out and hung on the line to dry with the still stained areas marked out ready to be worked on again next time.

But it had to be Sherlock, with anyone else Mycroft could have just “played” at this and he knew himself well enough to know that’s what he would have done, giving the answers that would have made it seem like they were having breakthroughs, revealing nothing moving nothing forwards, playing lip service. Sherlock would have none of that. He and Greg were the only people, other family included who could tell when Mycroft was being honestly himself, when he wasn’t using one of the hundred almost but not quite identical personae he had at his fingertips.

This all said, however, Mycroft found it … annoying was he supposed the word, how much Sherlock kept returning to his childhood, to their childhood, and to their mother and father’s relationship. After Sherlock’s opening comment about Graham Mycroft had expected that he would pursue that ‘line of enquiry’ but even though Sherlock had barely even known their father that was where he concentrated his attention and Mycroft wondered if he was just using this situation to try and satisfy his limitless curiosity. When in anger he raised that possibility Sherlock looked at him blankly for a moment,

“You think I didn’t find out what had gone on?” he asked. Mycroft thought there was genuine surprise at where the conversation had gone and he realised that, yes, he had thought that, thought that Sherlock would have considered such ancient family history irrelevant. Sherlock had continued to speak, “No, the facts of their affairs aren’t the issue here, the issue is what if any effect they’ve had on your views of relationships and trust.” And they were off again. Mycroft didn’t want Sherlock to know some of what had gone on but he realised now that it was almost certainly too late, even if he stopped now Sherlock would unravel it all and know and be faced with that knowing on his own with no one to help.

“I want to stop now,” Mycroft began,

“Getting too much for you?” Sherlock asked but without the side that Mycroft would have expected,

“For the time being, yes. I can’t say that I’m finding this easy but it may be useful, I just think that we might be getting to something that will need more than a half-hour chat. Can we say next week?”

The pre-John Sherlock would never have let that go but he accepted it and they walked back through the park towards Baker Street. When they got there Sherlock spoke,

“Would you rather meet at the Diogenes?”

Mycroft thought for a moment before he agreed, there were aspects of this that required privacy.

The decision made they went in to 221B to find Greg and John watching _Football Focus_. Sherlock was clearly inclined to be facetious, probably a reaction Mycroft thought,

“ _Football_ therapy? Really, John?”

“What works, works,” he replied with an easy smile, “I made you coffee,” he continued, “Sherlock, come and help me with it.”

The look on Sherlock’s face was priceless, he couldn’t have looked more horrified if John had suggested a specific sex act with a duck, but after a moment he followed John into the kitchen. Mycroft knew he was being given a moment to talk to Greg with at least the fiction that no one was listening. He took the moment,

“How did it go?” he asked, having decided that this was more neutral than ‘How are you?’. Greg continued to stare at the television for a little while before he sat forward, elbows on his knees looking at his hands and finally spoke,

“Ok? I don’t know, I really don’t know. John said that he didn’t want to talk about the attack, which kind of surprised me, but he said that since I didn’t remember it, what would be the point and I suppose I can see what he means.” It was a question that Mycroft had wondered about. He waited for Greg to continue speaking, “So we talked about the things that worry me, the things I can’t get out of my head,” he paused, darting one quick look up at Mycroft’s face before returning to the contemplation of his hands, “He’s given me some, I suppose exercises would be the word, things to try when I … get stuck, just asked me to try them and keep a record of whether they help.”

Mycroft could hear a quiet conversation coming from the kitchen but he didn’t make the attempt to hear what John and Sherlock were saying. He’d known that there were things that were going on in Greg’s head that he hadn’t shared, but he found the idea of John knowing them when he didn’t far more difficult than he had imagined he would, but then curiosity was the besetting sin of all of the Holmes family and it was a slight comfort that it would probably bother Sherlock more than it bothered him. Greg spoke again,

“If you asked me, I’d tell you.”

“When you want to tell me you will.”

 

Mycroft could, of course seen Sherlock more frequently than Greg was seeing John but he decided that it would be better if they followed the same schedule, which left him in the ‘speaker’s’ room at The Diogenes the next Saturday morning for his second meeting with his brother.

Mycroft heard him coming of course, Sherlock always made a point of wearing his loudest shoes when he came to the club, Mycroft usually tried to dismiss it as a juvenile reaction, and wondered if Sherlock even knew by now what point it was he was trying to make. One of the stewards opened the door and Sherlock walked in like he owned the place. Mycroft restricted himself to a confirming nod when Sherlock was speaking straight away before the door was shut, it was going to be one of those mornings, and Mycroft was on the point of calling the whole thing off when he realised that Sherlock was giving him that excuse if he needed it, and knowing that he also knew that he didn’t need it, a line from an old film ran through his mind, _hang on, it’s going to be a bumpy ride_ , and sure enough Sherlock pitched in without any pre-amble,

“So when did you first know about father’s affairs?”

It was a factual question and Mycroft answered it, hoping but not believing that they would stay on the factual. Sherlock gave the impression of not having emotions, of not understanding his own feelings but that didn’t mean that he didn’t have an intimate knowledge as to how emotions could be the motivation for all manner of things.

There were aspects of the unravelling of his parents’ marriage of which Sherlock was unaware and Mycroft did not much want to enlighten him, yet he kept coming back to the same issues,

“So when did you find out?” Sherlock asked again and Mycroft knew that he was not likely to leave it alone and so he pulled together an answer that he hoped but did not expect would satisfy him,

“I knew right from the start.”

“It was you who knew first?”

It was only the shape of a question, it was obvious that Sherlock knew the answer and that fact irritated Mycroft and made him snappish in his answer,

“Since you clearly know the answer, why bother asking the question?”

Sherlock did not respond to the question, he just continued his own questions,

“Did you tell Mummy?”

 _Damn him, Mycroft thought,_ exactly the question I was hoping he wouldn’t ask, as if I didn’t know better,

“No,”

“Why not?”

He wanted to lie, but found that he could not,

“Because he begged me not to, because he said he’d have to leave, because he said we’d have to stay with Mummy, because he wouldn’t be there anymore.” It was stupidly hard to take a breath to continue, but he did, “And so I gave in to his veiled threats and it just made everything worse.”

The look on Sherlock’s face, the shock, the fact that this was clearly not what he’d been expecting would have given Mycroft some satisfaction in any other situation, now it just seemed of a piece with the way he’d treated Greg.

Sherlock, having taken a moment to process, continued,

“You were how old?” he asked,

Again Mycroft knew that he knew the answer but replied anyway,

“Nine, nearly ten,”

“And yet this was your fault? Not the fault of the forty-year old? Not the fault of the thirty-five year old?”

During the course of the next three quarters of an hour Sherlock ruthlessly forced him to re-live his feelings about their parents’ marriage, coming back time and again to how his father’s boyfriends had made him feel as he’d realised that he too was attracted to men.

And of course spelled out like that it was blatantly obvious, and obvious that he would let Graham treat him so badly, and he wasn’t at all sure that he didn’t feel worse about how he’d treated Greg.

After an hour he called an end to the proceedings and the two brothers walked back to Baker Street in silence. When they got to 221B Sherlock unexpectedly gripped his arm,

“I hate saying this,” he began, and when Mycroft would have interrupted, he held up a hand, “but thank you, I really don’t like to think about being left with Mummy when you went away to school,” he paused for a moment before he smiled one of his rare, genuine smiles, “you probably saved yourself years of visiting me on a Sunday at the asylum.” Mycroft smiled back but it must have been unconvincing, “There’s more isn’t there? Something you really don’t want to talk about?” Sherlock turned away from the door and started walking with a “Come on,” thrown over his shoulder. Mycroft considered just walking in to 221B, but knew that there was a fifty-fifty chance that Sherlock would follow him and insist on asking the questions right there with John and Greg as witnesses and so he followed his brother back to the park.

“So, something else happened?”

“Not really,” Mycroft said quietly, “nothing that has any bearing on anything.”

“Well, I think we both know that’s not true, but I’ll allow that it’s something you don’t want to talk about.”

He stopped speaking as the two of them walked a further fifty yards down the pathway with Mycroft realising that he felt like a John le Carré spy so that when Sherlock turned to look at him he was smiling,

“What’s funny?” Sherlock asked,

“Nothing,” Mycroft replied, “I just suddenly realised that we must look like some minor cultural attachés exchanging state secrets.”

The image must also have struck Sherlock because there was a glimmer of an answering smile for a moment before he continued,

“Did he do anything to you?”

Mycroft stopped walking, just for a second, before his pace evened out again despite his suddenly weak knees. He supposed that he could see where the question had come from but the thought was hideous and worse because now he was left wondering if Sherlock had a more personal reason for asking the question. For that reason alone he realised that he was going to have to answer the question properly,

“No, he didn’t,”

Sherlock stopped this time, looking his brother square in the eyes, and Mycroft continued,

“It was something and nothing, one of his paramours caught me spying, groped me, I head butted him and ran off, I really don’t think it’s warped me any more than the whole situation did anyway,” he paused, trying to find the right words for his next question before deciding that straight out asking the question would be best, “Did he do anything to you?” Mycroft bit off the rest of it, the ‘if he did I will make the remainder of his life a living misery.’

Sherlock was still staring at him, processing the new information before he replied,

“No, nothing like that. Which of them was it?”

Mycroft turned and began walking again at a slower pace, waiting for Sherlock to catch up with him before he replied,

“It doesn’t matter. He died some years ago. Once I was able to I kept an eye on him, he didn’t have ready access to any other children.”

“What did he die of?”

“Does it matter?” he glanced at his brother and saw that it did, “Liver cancer, not a good way to go.”

They walked further before Sherlock spoke again,

“I was always mildly surprised that father never caught anything,”

“Dumb luck, I suppose.” Mycroft replied,

“Maybe that’s what I inherited from him,” Sherlock said and Mycroft smiled slightly before Sherlock continued, “So you don’t think that this has a relevance?”

Mycroft thought as they turned down another path, walking at an easy pace,

“It may have. I don’t think so, and it wasn’t something I necessarily wanted to burden you with, so I kept it to myself.”

“But as we know, we each of us have an ability to ferret out information,”

“Even if that information will hurt ourselves or the others around us. That’s why I chose to speak to you and not to someone ‘qualified’, you would not be fooled by answers that were less than truthful; no one qualified would be qualified to deal with either of us.”

“No, they wouldn’t,” Sherlock agreed as they turned back towards Baker Street. They walked in silence until they were nearly back to the gates of the park,

“What about you, Sherlock, has it ever occurred to you that it might be helpful to you to talk to someone?”

Mycroft half expected a snarky or a cutting response or no response at all, but Sherlock did answer,

“I would worry that exploring my psyche might leave me less able to do what I do. That is something I couldn’t bear.”

 

It was a Friday night. The two of them had never really had the ‘thank God it’s Friday’ thing, neither’s work really fitted into that nine-to-five weekdays mould but when the two of them were free it was a lazy time of the week, a time for them both to decompress.

At least it had been but then they’d spent weeks more or less apart and then together but both so worried about hurting the other that nothing was normal and now Friday nights were spent being worried about Saturday morning. On this particular Friday night the television was on but being ignored, Greg was writing in a notebook that Mycroft knew was part of what John had asked him to do, and Mycroft was honestly trying to read but spending rather more time watching Greg, trying to gauge whether there had been any improvement. Mycroft wasn’t aware of the tension in the room until Greg spoke without looking up,

“Will you for God’s sake stop staring at me?”

“I’m not,” Mycroft said, the denial coming automatically,

“You bloody well are and it’s getting wearing, if you’ve got something to say, if you’ve got something to ask then for pity’s sake spit it out!”

Mycroft was on the point of denying it again but realised it was pointless, and merely apologised,

“Sorry, I’ll try and focus more on my reading.” He hadn’t intended it to come out quite so snarky, but he was tired and he was worried,

“Yes, and I’ll try to stop being so distracting, shall I?” Greg said as he got up and pointedly walked into the bedroom. Mycroft was suddenly beyond annoyed by the whole situation and was on his feet and following Greg without even really knowing what he was doing,

“So,” he said, aware on some level of the fact that he had raised his voice but not caring, “you’re stamping off in a huff now? I’m not supposed to be concerned as to how you are?”

“You could just ask, instead of spending the whole time staring at me!”

“Like you’d tell me if I did ask? Ever since you started seeing John you’ve been closed off,”

“My fault as usual then, never you!” Greg was on his feet now, the notebook he had been writing in creased and forgotten in his clenched hand,

“I just bloody apologised, for god’s sake, of course I’m not saying it’s your fault! All I want is to know how you are and you won’t bloody tell me, what am I supposed to do?”

“I won’t tell you? That’s fucking rich, coming from you! You haven’t said a bloody word about what you and Sherlock have spoken about,”

Mycroft interrupted,

“Of course I haven’t, I’ve already burdened you enough with my traumas, haven’t I?” He would have carried on but for Greg suddenly surging forward and standing inches away from him,

“And of course it’s vital to you that I should be the only one here with problems, heaven forbid that you should have any weaknesses, eh Mycroft? No, past traumas are for lesser mortals, right? For poor sad acts like me!”

Mycroft pushed him away,

“Sod off, when have I ever tried to pretend that I’ve never had any traumas? After I told you about Graham, when you’ve met my mother, I didn’t realise this was supposed to be some sort of bloody ‘I’m more screwed up than you’ competition!”

“You know there’s only you could possibly interpret this as a competition,”

“No, apparently there isn’t,” Mycroft snapped, “there’s you as well. Do you want to know what we spend Saturday’s talking about, is that it? I promise you it’s nothing uplifting, it’s nothing at all. Do you want your curiosity satisfying? Is that what this is about?”

“Well, it’s what you want isn’t it, can’t bear to have John know things about me that you don’t? I’m right aren’t I?”

“Of course I hate it!” Mycroft shouted, “I hate that anyone has ever known anything about you that I don’t, I hate that I can’t make this better and it has to be John who helps you, I hate that I can’t be there for you without Sherlock’s bloody help, I hate the whole fucking thing!”

Greg took a step back but clearly wasn’t ready to let this go just yet,

“Finally, I get some honesty! You don’t think I feel the same way? You don’t think I feel awful about the fact that you’re having to confront these things? I see what it takes out of you and I know that if I hadn’t been so stupid we’d neither of us be having to deal with this.”

“For the five thousandth time, you weren’t stupid, you were just unlucky!”

For some reason that Mycroft couldn’t immediately identify that seemed to bring Greg up short and he didn’t immediately reply and when he did he spoke quietly,

“No, I really was stupid, I left my drink unattended, I carried on drinking despite feeling peculiar, it was pure unmitigated stupidity.”

Mycroft hated to hear the defeated tone in Greg’s voice and suddenly the anger, and he had to admit it the jealousy he’d been feeling began to drain away. He took the two steps to the bed and sat down, slumped slightly into himself and after a moment or two he patted the bed next to him encouraging Greg to come and sit with him,

“You weren’t stupid, you just weren’t on your guard and why should you have been? You weren’t doing anything that you hadn’t done a hundred times before and nothing had gone wrong those times. I won’t tell you to lighten up on yourself, you know that you should, but perhaps I should be telling you lots more often that I don’t blame you for what happened.”

Greg turned towards him and wrapped his arms around his chest and in return Mycroft pulled him in close, resting the side of his face on the springy softness of Greg’s hair and he began to tell him what he and Sherlock had talked about this last few weeks.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I feel kind of bad for the parents I've saddled Sherlock and Mycroft with. The idea of their parents in this came way before we saw them in 'His Last Vow', I would probably write this different now!


	12. Chapter 12

Greg obviously couldn’t make every Saturday morning to talk to John, and Mycroft certainly didn’t speak to Sherlock every week. Sometimes when Greg came back from Baker Street he was quiet, sometimes he was angry and came into the flat briefly to get changed into running gear before he left again to try and pound some of his anger and aggression into the pathways of the park. He didn’t often talk about what they had talked about and never on the days when he came back angry. It unnerved Mycroft, no matter how much he knew intellectually that it wasn’t about him, he had to steel himself to avoid flinching when Greg was in that mood. It became a focus for a week or two of his discussions with Sherlock. Not of course that Sherlock went at the matter in a straightforward way.

“The problem is,” Sherlock said, and how Mycroft had grown to hate that expression from his brother, “that I don’t think you have an accurate view of what was going on at home. It’s like you’ve shut it all away somewhere, like you don’t remember the screaming and shouting.”

Mycroft looked at his brother nonplussed for a moment before he swallowed, thought for a moment and spoke,

“Do you remember a lot of fighting?” he asked.

Sherlock rolled his eyes in that endearing way he had,

“Of course there was!” He looked intently at Mycroft for a moment and then continued, “I suppose you went away at a much younger age than me,” he said, “but surely it must have carried on when you were home for holidays, mustn’t it?”

Mycroft honestly tried to think back to what it had been like and found that what he had wasn’t so much actual memories but a … narrative was he supposed the right word, a constructed narrative with little or no attached emotion. It was a shock and it took a lot of self-control for Mycroft not to respond in a way designed to deflect Sherlock into another pathway of enquiry, or even to attempt to provoke an argument. Instead he took a deep breath and asked a question that he had avoided asking for many years,

“What was it like there after I went to school?”

 _A day of surprises_ , Mycroft thought at Sherlock’s rapidly hidden reaction to the question,

“I don’t suppose it changed much,” Sherlock replied, with some confusion,

“But as you have pointed out, I don’t have a clear memory of what it was like, you were there until you were much older than I, what was it like?”

Sherlock sat for a moment, to anyone else apart from Mycroft, and possibly John, he would have looked like the picture of calm control but Mycroft could see the minute tells, the things that showed that the question was a problem to him. There was a long pause, one that Mycroft decided not to end and eventually Sherlock spoke,

“It was all lies, everything there. You’d taught me about deductions, about observing and seeing and … all I saw was lies.” There was a long pause, “And I couldn’t work out why. I couldn’t see how things wouldn’t be better if people were telling the truth. Half the time they weren’t even lying about things that mattered.” Mycroft could hear the confusion in his brother’s voice even after all this time, “They were my first investigation, the one I came back to most often, the one that made me realise that emotions were the antithesis of logic and sense.” He looked up and caught the tail end of Mycroft’s reaction to what he had just said. He leaned forward, “You can stop that right now!” he said.

“Stop what?” Mycroft asked, having quickly schooled his features into passivity,

“That horrified ‘what have I done’ face. You did nothing. To a certain extent they did nothing. I stopped resenting you for going away to school decades ago, you remember what I said, have always said about emotions. The point of this exercise is to help you not dredge up imagined traumas from my childhood.”

Mycroft looked down at his hand on the arm of the wingback chair and then forced himself to look Sherlock in the eye, 

“It’s not an imagined trauma but I take your point. Neither of us are our parents’ keepers. They made their choices. I should have taken more care of you when I was home, but I’ve known that for years. So the ‘shouting and screaming’ as you term it, what effect are you positing it had on me?”

“Are you asking me what effect I think it had on you?” Sherlock asked, “Because if so then I don’t think this is how this is supposed to go as I understand it. The idea is that you are supposed to think your way through it and reach the revelation with just a few carefully neutral questions from me.”

“What have you been watching on the television?” Mycroft asked,

“Nothing, but you surely didn’t expect me not to have done some research?”

“I didn’t expect that, no, but as we have just uncovered, I am a somewhat ‘unreliable narrator’ of my own life,”

“Everyone is!” Sherlock interrupted, “Everyone recasts and refocuses their experiences, that’s why working out what happened at a crime scene is a challenge, everybody lies, some on purpose, some without knowing it, but everybody lies. You are no different except in the fact that you are brighter than most.”

“Why thank you,” Mycroft replied with an ironic bow of his head, “Brighter than most,”

“Yes, but don’t let it go to your head, and don’t shy away from the question.”

Mycroft paused for a moment and then spoke quietly,

“I’m not shying away from the question, I would genuinely like to know what effect you think it’s had. You’re the observer who sees the most of the game.” He stopped speaking, instead leaning forward to pick up the stone cold tea on the small table between them and taking a sip before he continued, “Until you asked that question I hadn’t realised that I don’t have much in the way of real memories of that time, let alone any insight into how Mummy and Daddy’s drama affected me.”

Sherlock took a moment before he replied,

“It has made you averse to any confrontation on personal matters.”

Mycroft’s first reaction was to argue, after all he was deservedly feared and he could point to any number of MPs and even most Ministers who paled visibly at the thought of a visit from him, but Sherlock interrupted him before he could articulate any of that,

“I don’t mean at work, obviously, I mean in strictly personal matters. Mummy, Graham, me, even Greg, you roll over and let each of us take what we want rather than have the argument.”

Mycroft knew that he was flushing at this comment,

“Yes, because we never have arguments, do we, it’s practically what we’re known for!”

“No, we don’t have arguments, I argue and you just stand there and take it. It’s only the fact that Greg is such a good person that means that you don’t end up in the same situation with him. That’s what effect I think their _sturm und drang_ had on you. I know that’s not how you react in work and I think that’s the clue that really identifies the cause and effect, when it’s personal you fall back on patterns you learned so long ago you no longer even properly remember them.”

Mycroft wanted to argue, wanted to tell Sherlock that he was talking rubbish, but a moment’s thought told him that this was probably not the case. His mind was drawn to the arguments he could remember with his mother and suddenly he recalled how Greg had been the one to get her out of Sherlock’s hospital room, how he hadn’t even been able to find a way even to start. It made him pause and think about other non-arguments. It was briefly difficult to admit that Sherlock was right, but that was the point of him being here,; if he knew everything then what was the point?

“I need to think about this,” he said, “think about it and decide,” he paused unable to easily articulate what he was thinking. Sherlock interrupted,

“I’m not necessarily suggesting that anything needs doing about it,” Mycroft wondered how it was that Sherlock knew what he was thinking, “but if you’re aware then you can make decisions for yourself, instead of only thinking that’s what you are doing.”

 

It was late on Saturday. Greg had come back from Baker Street in a filthy mood which hadn’t been alleviated much by the couple of hours he’d spent running after he’d returned. Mycroft had asked him if he was OK and been told that he was ‘bloody fine’. He hadn’t asked any further, telling himself that he needed not to nag at him, that he needed to give Greg space to process whatever he and John had been talking about but still it niggled at him. 

Greg in his turn had spent the evening reading reports for work, at least nominally; Mycroft was more than aware of the fact that he hadn’t turned a page for half an hour. Greg’s obvious tension through the evening was putting him more and more on edge and his tension seemed to be making Greg worse. _A vicious circle or perhaps more like a chain reaction, Three Mile Island on explosion day_ , Mycroft thought. He got up to make a cup of tea, reflecting on the Britishness of making a brew as a tension breaker. Greg continued to stare at the work papers that Mycroft knew he wasn’t reading.

When Mycroft brought the two mugs of tea into the room Greg didn’t even look up so he just put Greg’s cup down on the nearest corner of the coffee table. Greg grunted. Mycroft didn’t say anything just went and sat down with his own cup. It seemed that wasn’t enough for Greg this evening,

“I’d have said if I’d wanted a brew,” Greg said without looking up from his papers,

“You’re under no obligation to drink it,” Mycroft said and then took a sip of his own tea,

Greg snapped he papers down onto the sofa next to him,

“You’re under no obligation to drink it!” Greg parroted. Suddenly Mycroft was blazingly angry, it had been such a childish thing and so like a thousand and one ‘conversations’ Mycroft had had with school mates and college mates and his brother and his mother, but somehow coming from Greg it was worse,

“No, you’re not, perhaps I’d have been better getting you ‘juice’ if you’re going to behave like a child.”

Greg stood up and was shouting immediately,

“I suppose everyone is a child to you!”

“Oh, this is ridiculous,” Mycroft replied, getting up, “I’m going to bed.”

“Because I’m too ridiculous to even speak to is that it?”

“Right at this moment? Yes!” A small part of Mycroft was horrified, that small part was more than drowned out by the anger he was feeling, “I don’t know what the hell is the matter with you but I can’t see anything to be gained by continuing this.” He turned determined to leave the room but he stopped at Greg’s next words,

“You’ve always thought I was stupid!”

Mycroft turned round so fast that he actually hurt his neck and then crowded forward into Greg’s space,

“I’ve never thought you were stupid until thirty seconds ago. When have I ever said I thought you were stupid?”

“You don’t have to say it, it’s bloody obvious!”

“Only to you because it’s all in your head!”

Mycroft was breathing fast and he felt a bubble of satisfaction at Greg’s dark, angry flush at the words, but only for a moment, only for the second that it took to mentally replay what he’d said, then nausea took over and he would have apologised had Greg not spoken,

“Yeah, that’d be about right, we all know I’m mental,”

“That’s not what I said,” Mycroft answered, taking a step backwards and a deep breath, purposely moderating his tone from the previous near shout, “it’s not even close to what I said,” he didn’t even try to keep the desperation out of his voice but Greg was not having it,

“It’s exactly what you said and you’re right, you should go.” He spoke with a fatigue to his voice that Mycroft hadn’t heard for months, since right after it happened, since their conversation in 221B. Mycroft was suddenly scared and that fear and desperation sparked his anger again and he shouted,

“Fuck! Are you never going to stop saying that? I can’t say this any plainer, I am not leaving you.”

“You will,” Greg answered, and he turned away, moving back to the sofa and sitting down.

Mycroft took a deep breath and went and sat next to Greg, closer than instinct told him was a good idea for two people who had been shouting at each other moments ago. Wondering if it was going to get him thumped he put his arm around Greg and pulled him towards his side. For a moment Greg’s muscles stiffened and he fought the pull towards Mycroft and then with a mingled sigh that was almost a sob, he leaned in against Mycroft and a moment later Mycroft felt his shirt becoming damp as Greg cried. Mycroft turned slightly so that he could better get his arm around Greg and just held him.

It wasn't for long that Mycroft held Greg, feeling him slowly relax but Mycroft could feel his own tension falling away as well. Greg sat up and smiled somewhat soggily at Mycroft,

“Sorry about that,” he said, only fleetingly looking Mycroft in the eye, “I don't know what came over me.”

Mycroft wanted to leave it at that but he also wanted for it not to happen again, for the two of them to move forward. He wanted to ask straight out what John and Greg had been talking about but he knew he shouldn't and couldn't do that. So instead he shared his and Sherlock's conversation hoping that it would give Greg the space he needed to share what was really bothering him. Mycroft didn't fool himself that Greg wouldn't realise what he was doing, the man was far too bright for that. When Mycroft had finished telling him about the weirdness of his lack of recollection of his parents’ marriage and how it had taken Sherlock to remind him what it had been like.

“That must have been weird as hell, realising that you didn't really remember it, how are you feeling?”

Mycroft paused, thinking, before he answered,

“I've always relied on my mind, far more than I relied on my body which certainly in my early years was not really my friend, to find that things aren't what I thought they were? I suppose it's making me wonder how much I should be relying on what I think.”

“I think none of us are quite as objective as we'd like to think we are when it comes to our families,” Greg replied, “I don't suppose my parents are as bad as I'd like to think they are,” he paused for a second, “or at least I don't suppose my dad is. And I suppose that at least you can say that my mother has the courage of her convictions when it comes to 'my lifestyle'.”

“Do you think you'll want to see them again?” Mycroft asked,

“Yeah, probably. I've been thinking about that, when the case comes up I guess I should let them know. It all ought to be confidential, but that doesn't always work, I ought to give them a heads up at least, even if I don't think it will make much difference.” He paused, and Mycroft was thinking how amazingly forgiving Greg could be, he'd wanted to visit all sorts of petty inconveniences on the two of them. It must have shown on his face, “You haven't been quietly making their lives a misery have you?”

It was asked as a joke, but there was an undercurrent. Mycroft was glad he could answer straightforwardly,

“If they have parking tickets then it's purely because they parked where they shouldn't and nobody has recently got planning permission to build an all-night take-away leaning on their garden fence or if they have,” he clarified quickly, “it's not through any doing of mine.”

Greg chuckled gently,

“A group home for tearaways would probably be worse than the restaurant, but thanks, I don't suppose they can help the way they are.” Greg's expression became more sober and he continued, “You were right, of course, it was what John and I talked about this morning that put me in such a bad mood.” There was a long pause that Mycroft itched to fill but he waited with at least the outward signs of patience and eventually Greg continued, “We were talking about how afraid I've been and we covered some exercises, well not really exercises, so much as ways to think about things and he asked me to think about whether there were any advantages to being scared. He's asked questions like that before but that one really hit home.” Mycroft wanted to protest at that, found himself annoyed at John for the implication that Greg was doing any of this on purpose, but Greg held up a restraining hand and carried on speaking, “No it was a good question to ask and if there wasn't something in it then I don't suppose it would have bothered me. I was just over and over thinking 'how dare he say that' while part of me could see what he was saying which made it worse. Anyway it's none of it your fault and I shouldn't have taken it out on you, that's for sure.”

“You didn't, really. Did you reach a conclusion, or is it still a work in progress?” It was far the most direct question he'd asked Greg about his work with John and he felt uncomfortable about it but Greg replied with no argument,

“I think I need to, what's that awful self-helpy phrase? 'Feel the fear and do it anyway?', I guess that was what John was trying to say, or at least trying to get me to say. I suppose it's worked really. There's one thing you could do to help, though?”

“Anything,” Mycroft replied,

“Could you try to be, I don't know, a little less careful around me? You've been wonderful, love, but you don't treat me the same. Look at this afternoon, if I'd come in in such a filthy mood before you'd have said something, told me to pull myself together, or at least asked me what the hell was going on, these days you just put up with it all and I'm not sure it's good for me. I feel like I'm becoming the Victorian Father in this relationship, 'He who must not be upset', it's not good for me and eventually I'm worried that you'll come to resent me.”

Mycroft thought for a moment before he replied,

“I don't think I could ever resent you but I take your point,” he paused again, “It’s just that, are you sure that I would have told you to pull yourself together? After what Sherlock and I talked about, about how I deal with the people I’m close to, would I have done that?”

“I think you’d have asked me what was up at least.”

“I haven’t wanted you to feel like I was questioning you about what you and John were discussing, I know such things are meant to be private.”

“I knew that was what you were thinking, but when I get turned in on myself like this afternoon, well, it made me wonder if you were just tired of the whole thing, whether you’d lost interest. Stupid really.”

“Yes,” Mycroft said, “I would agree that the idea that I would lose interest in any aspect of you is a little stupid,” and he leaned towards Greg and kissed him before continuing in a considered tone of voice, “It will be difficult, but I'll do my best to be argumentative and nasty if that's what you really want.”

Greg grinned,

“That would be perfect.”

Mycroft leaned over and kissed him again, this time a passionate kiss that made Greg go pliant and relaxed in his arms. When they finally broke apart, Greg was a little breathless but he was again grinning,

“Yes, that's a big part of what I had in mind when I said about being less careful!”

 

Mycroft highly favoured sleeping snugged up to Greg’s back even with the great potential for waking up with a dead left arm. 

When they had gone back to sleeping in the same bed it had been many weeks before he’d let himself sleep in that position, afraid that it would seem that he was pushing for something for which Greg was not ready and for a few weeks after Greg had declared himself ready for pretty much anything Mycroft had had his own reasons for not sleeping like that. It still troubled him, wanting Greg as he did. 

When he was first with Greg he’d been blindsided by how much he _wanted_ Greg, how all-consuming his desire was, how physical he wanted to be; prior to Greg such physicality would have been anathema to him and after the attack his desire had suddenly been wrapped up in Graham’s warped ideas and the brutality of the men who had raped Greg. It had taken weeks, months even he supposed, before the picture of Greg in that bloody alley wasn’t the first thing that popped into his mind when he thought about him and Greg together. He’d worked at it and here they were. It felt strange to count as a victory getting back to where they had been a year ago, but it was a victory nonetheless. Then last night there had been Greg’s admission that he didn’t want Mycroft to be careful of him.

And now here was Greg pretending not very successfully to be asleep. Well, two could play at that game, Mycroft thought, as he casually tightened the grip he had round Greg’s chest, as though he was just moving in his sleep. Greg tensed up and then almost as quickly relaxed back against him,

“You know I’m awake, don’t you?” he asked and Mycroft could hear the grin in his voice. Greg didn’t wait for an answer, “I can’t ever fool you, can I? And I’m never going to wake up before you either,” and then he sighed and gently pulled Mycroft’s hand up to his mouth, first leaving one chaste kiss in the centre of his palm and then beginning to suck at that same spot. Before long he moved on and to nibble and suck one long finger with serious intent. Mycroft began to harden. He wanted Greg. Gently he pulled his hand from Greg’s grasp to slide it firmly down Greg’s stomach and then further down until he grasped Greg through the thin cotton of his pyjama trousers. Greg groaned and for a second everything about him went soft and relaxed except for his prick and then he pushed back tighter against Mycroft, grinding his backside against Mycroft’s hard length. 

Just slightly cautiously Mycroft moved his hand up and then under Greg’s waistband but the groan that this produced removed all caution as he stroked Greg from root to tip, slowly and teasingly, knowing that he wasn’t grasping as firmly as Greg would prefer, waiting for him to say something. When he did it was more of a whine which made Mycroft grin,

“Myyyyyyyyyyyy!”

“What? What’s the matter, dear heart?”

“You swine! You know very well what’s the matter, come on!”

This last was accompanied by Greg reaching behind himself to pull at Mycroft’s pyjamas. Mycroft waited for the sinking feeling he expected, but it didn’t come, all he felt was an eagerness to match Greg’s as he quickly divested himself of the trousers and reached for the drawer with the lube as Greg rolled over onto his front.

 

“You know,” Greg said, “this feeling afterwards is almost better.”

Mycroft raised one quizzical eyebrow and Greg continued,

“Well, you know it isn’t, but I think I might have missed it more. The feeling as we both cool down, knowing that one of us will eventually get cold enough to reach for the duvet, knowing that we’ll probably drift off to sleep for a little while, but we’ll still be touching each other.”

Mycroft closed his eyes but one tear still escaped and Greg noticed,

“Oh, My, I’m sorry,” he said beginning to sit up,

“Don’t be idiotic,” Mycroft said, but the smile he managed through the glistening tears softened the words, “I’m not upset I’m just … phenomenally grateful that this is where we are now, where we’re back to.”

Then it was Mycroft’s turn to worry that what he’d said could be taken the wrong way but only briefly as Greg leaned over and kissed him thoroughly. When he drew back slightly he scrunched himself down the bed a little to rest his head against Mycroft’s shoulder,

“I’m always grateful that we are here, that you are here.”

Mycroft dropped one kiss on his forehead and pulled him closer as they both drifted into a doze.

 

Greg’s shift patterns usually meant that Mycroft was the first one home, so he was more than a little surprised when he got home on the following Thursday to find Greg sat on the sofa. Mycroft stopped on the threshold of the living room and attempted to work out what was going on but couldn’t. He was about to ask when Greg spoke,

“They’ve got a date for the trial. Sally sent me home, I just couldn’t concentrate once Reedley had told me.”

Mycroft quickly put down the small attaché case he was carrying and shrugged off his jacket before moving to sit next to Greg. His first reaction was to give him room but he quickly moved up so that he was sat so that they were touching from shoulder to hip. He waited for a few moments, wondering if Greg would say more but when he didn’t Mycroft spoke,

“And how do you feel about that?” he asked, aware that he sounded like a therapist from a TV Show, all neutral questions, and no judgement, but it was still a question that need to be asked. When Greg finally spoke it was in a quiet voice,

“I don’t bloody know,” he paused and then continued, “Anxious, excited, and of course the never-ending scared, I just don’t know.”

“When will it be then?” Mycroft asked,

“Four weeks from Friday.”

“And do they have any idea how long it will take?”

“Deb reckoned about a week. You don’t need to worry about time off.”

“It’s not a worry,” Mycroft replied, “there is no way I’m leaving you to go through this on your own. This is one of those times when I’m going to do what I think is right, like you asked at weekend.” This last was said with a smile, and Mycroft felt great relief when it won an attempt at an answering smile from Greg,

“Thanks, I probably won’t want you in when I’m testifying, will that be OK? I just think I need to not be worrying about how that bit is affecting you, but just having you there so that I know I can get to you straight away when it’s all finished?”

“It would seem strange to say I’ll gladly be there, but I’ll certainly gladly be there to support you. Do you want to talk to John about this?”

Greg considered this for a minute or two, absently chewing on his thumb nail before he replied,

“Probably but not until Saturday as usual, would you come with me? I think I’d like it if we had, I don’t know … strategies? In place, you know for whatever might happen.” He paused again before turning slightly so that he was looking more directly at Mycroft, “You know they’re likely to try and make out that this was all consensual, don’t you?”

Mycroft swallowed before he replied and he couldn’t quite bring himself to look Greg directly in the eye,

“Yes, I had thought that they might try and use that as a defence tactic. I dare say I’ll be able to keep my anger in check, but how will you deal with it?”

“It’s different for me, I’ve had practice at being called a liar in open court, albeit from a slightly different perspective. I expect it to be bad, and I’m not getting my hopes up for a conviction. The problem is the DNA is so unassailable as evidence goes that they have no alternative than go for a ‘theory of the crime’ that makes it not a crime, that it was just ‘gay sex’ and you know what they’re like.”

“Surely in this day and age that won’t fly?” Mycroft tried to keep the anger out of his voice but he was aware that he was only marginally successful.

“Juries are funny things,” Greg replied, “there’s no predicting them. Anyway, enough of this for now, if I sit and think about it much longer I’ll go barmy. Find us something good to watch and I’ll put some food together, that is if you don’t have work to do?”

“I don’t, not tonight, I’ll try and find us something nice and distracting!”


	13. Chapter 13

Friday – 4 weeks before the start of the trial.

Greg’s nervousness was obvious. Sally had been exactly right to suggest that he should go home once DI Reedley had told him the date. The nerves however were not getting any better. Greg wasn’t being snappy with him, he was just abstracted, his mind constantly elsewhere. Mycroft wondered about suggesting that the two of them go away for a holiday somewhere but he wasn’t sure how Greg would take the suggestion and more importantly whether not having the distraction even of work would actually make him worse. By the Friday of the same week Greg was all but pacing the room and Mycroft knew that he had to do something, so when he came home from the office he quickly got changed and joined Greg in the living room,

“I was wondering,” he said, feeling the beginnings of a blush developing, “if you wanted to go out somewhere this evening?”

This suggestion was a sufficient departure from routine that Greg must almost have hurt his neck from the speed at which he turned to look at Mycroft. Promisingly though Greg was smiling faintly,

“Where is the real Mycroft and what have you done with him?” he asked pausing for a second before he continued, “Seriously, if you’ve kidnapped Mycroft Holmes, I don’t think you’re aware of the shit-storm that’s about to descend upon you!”

Mycroft now felt that his blush must by now actually be showing up on satellite images, but he swallowed and continued, determined,

“I’m perfectly serious, I think we should go dancing somewhere hot and loud and with much alcohol.”

“Seriously, My, you’re worrying me now, is it possible that you’ve got some kind of brain tumour or something? You do remember that we’ve never gone dancing in the entire time we’ve been together don’t you?”

Mycroft cleared his throat and adjusted his sleeves, rather regretting that since he had got changed he had no cufflinks to fiddle with,

“I am aware of that,” he confirmed with a slight smile, “but I know that you used to go out dancing, before I was on the scene, and,” he paused and swallowed again, “and I wondered if you could teach me?”

Greg stared at him for another couple of moments,

“Really?” but Mycroft could tell from the sparkle in his eyes that Greg wasn’t averse to the idea,

“Really.”

 

Greg had been quite careful about selecting the club they went to and more careful about selecting the clothes they wore and their hair and really everything. When Mycroft asked about this Greg had given him a look and then asked,

“Do you trust me?”

“Of course!”

“Then trust me on the fact that if you feel the part you’ll enjoy this evening far more than if you don’t.”

“I put myself in your hands,” Mycroft replied and then leaned in for a kiss that lasted for quite a while. When they finally broke apart, both of them were breathless.

“We are,” Greg continued, with a quick peck on the cheek for Mycroft, “going to be the hottest couple there.”

 

The wall of sound that hit them when they entered the club was almost like a physical assault as far as Mycroft was concerned and he half expected Greg to turn around when faced with it, but he didn’t, instead Mycroft was aware of an almost instant lightening of Greg’s mood, and in turn in his mood. When they got a little further into the room Greg turned and bellowed at him,

“Let’s go to the bar, I don’t know about you but I could seriously do with a drink, probably more than one, actually! What will you have?”

Mycroft pondered for a moment, he was determined that he wasn’t going to drink to excess this evening because he was sure that Greg would enjoy it more if he was sure that someone half-way sober was keeping his eyes open, but one or two drinks did seem like a good idea,

“Gin, please,” he replied

“Tonic?”

“Yes,” he shouted back.

 

Two drinks in, and still at the bar, Greg turned to Mycroft his eyes bright,

“We should dance!”

Mycroft could two-step and foxtrot with the best of them but as he glanced at the dance floor he genuinely couldn’t believe he could ever dance like that. He was about to say ‘no’ when he caught the faint hint of entreaty on Greg’s face. _This isn’t about me_ , he thought, _it’s about him_. He leaned forward and spoke directly into Greg’s ear,

“You’ll have to teach me,” He purposely pitched his voice low and when he’d finished he moved an inch or two closer and planted an open mouthed kiss on the pulse point below Greg’s jaw.

“Fuck,” Greg replied on a breath and Mycroft allowed his glance to drift lower to Greg’s groin, pleased at the response. Suddenly feeling like a teenager he let Greg drag him onto the dance floor. 

It wasn’t in any way like dancing, Mycroft was sure of that, it was rather more like sex. Greg had started them off facing each other and told Mycroft to follow what he was doing, but before much time at all had passed Greg was plastered all over him with his hands in the back pockets of the tight jeans he’d coaxed Mycroft into earlier and now Mycroft could see why they had been a good idea. The possessive feel of Greg’s hands on his arse made Mycroft feel very glad that Greg was so close to him, right up until Greg turned him round and continued to dance but this time with his hands in Mycroft’s hip pockets. Mycroft felt embarrassed, exposed and incredibly turned on. For the first twenty seconds he squirmed, trying to turn back towards Greg, but Greg was having none of it. So Mycroft relaxed into it and gradually, the feel of Greg against him, the heat, the noise and the drinks all combined until it all felt completely natural and Mycroft allowed himself to lean back against Greg, grinding against Greg and feeling his obvious interest. 

Greg leaned forward and whispered into his ear,

“If we were twenty-years younger, and I wasn’t a DI and you weren’t a whatever it is you are, then I’d bundle us both into the bogs and suck you off right now.”

It was Mycroft’s turn to swear, but Greg continued,

“As it is, we’ll have to wait until we get home, but then, my love I’m going to have you every way I can think of.”

Then he pulled Mycroft round and kissed him.

The two of them continued to dance for another couple of hours, repeatedly getting each other to the stage of almost but not quite coming in their pants until Mycroft for one was beginning to be in pain. A couple of times someone tried to cut in but it was easy enough to see them off. 

In the end it was Mycroft who weakened first and while they were yet again dancing this time with Greg in front of him, he spoke as quietly as was practical,

“We should go home, right now, because otherwise, jobs be damned, I _am_ going to drag you into the toilets!”

Greg turned and grinned at him,

“I thought you’d never ask!”

They just managed to keep their hands off each other in the cab home, but only because both of them resolutely stared straight in front and sat at the very extremes of the back seat.

 

Saturday – 3 weeks before the trial.

Mycroft fidgeted all the way to Baker Street. After all the weeks when he’d been intensely curious about what John and Greg were talking about he was finally going to be there and to his surprise he really wished he was heading to The Diogenes to meet Sherlock. Of course Greg picked up on this,

“This is making you nervous, isn’t it?”

“Is it that obvious?” Mycroft asked,

“I do keep rather a close eye on you, you know,” Greg replied with a smile before continuing, “We’re only going to talk about what the case might bring up, there won’t be anything you don’t know.” He paused for a long moment, the length of a block, “There isn’t really anything you don’t know.”

Mycroft believed that Greg believed that but still he strongly suspected that wasn’t true.

“I know the facts,” he said, “but I know less about how you feel about the facts or at least how you feel about them now you’ve more fully processed them.” He tried to keep his voice neutral but he really wasn’t sure he’d managed the trick.

Greg looked at him with a certain amount of confusion but Mycroft didn’t think that he could make clearer what he was getting at, at least not in the sort of conversation he wanted to have in the street on the way to an appointment. After a few more yards Greg continued,

“Are you worried that I … blame you or something?”

“No, not that,” Mycroft reassured him, “just I suppose you’re moving on with it and I’m not sure I will find that I’m on the same page with you. It’s inevitable that you will have processed it more and I don’t want to hold you back.”

“I see what you mean, I suppose,” Greg agreed, “but it’s only the same as you talking to Sherlock. The way I see it, we both had things we needed to think our way through, for me it was the fear and the internal victim blaming, for you it was,”

Mycroft interrupted, not wanting to be less forthcoming than Greg was managing,

“For me it was being able to qualitatively distinguish between my desires and the desires of those animals.”

There was a minute halt in Greg’s stride, someone less focussed on him would have missed it but Mycroft didn’t. He waited and finally Greg spoke,

“That’s kind of a relief.”

“What is?” Mycroft asked, genuinely unable to follow what Greg was thinking,

“Well, don’t get mad, because I honestly wouldn’t have blamed you, but I thought,” He stopped speaking and Mycroft waited for a while but when it became obvious that Greg couldn’t frame what he was trying to say Mycroft spoke,

“You won’t say anything that will upset me if that’s what concerns you,”

“I think I might,” Greg said with an attempt at a smile, but he squared his shoulders a little and continued, “I thought perhaps I seemed like ‘spoiled goods’, I could understand you not wanting to, I don’t know, be where they’d been?” He scrubbed at his hair for a moment, while Mycroft continued to walk on automatic pilot taking in what Greg was saying and then continued, “I’m not putting this very well, but if I felt, I don’t know, dirty, soiled, then I could see why you would feel the same about me.”

Mycroft spoke, wanting to say everything all at once and frightened that he was going to say the wrong thing or let Greg see a fraction of what he thought about that statement and still anxious that Greg should know that he had meant what he’d said about not getting upset by anything that Greg said,

“That wasn’t it at all! Nothing those … people could do to you could lessen you in my eyes or could in anyway change how I feel about you. It’s true that I don’t like to think about them touching you but that’s because they hurt you, they took from you and I don’t like anyone ever taking anything from you. It’s that simple.”

“Thanks,” Greg replied and they continued to walk in silence until they turned the corner onto Baker Street and Greg stopped and spoke again, hurriedly,

“As to the other thing, about you and that you wanted me being like them, it’s rubbish and it’s exactly what you said, they took, where you share, there’s a world of difference. Considering we’re talking about the same acts it’s just phenomenal how much difference there is.” With that he stopped, reached up to cup the back of Mycroft’s neck and kissed him quickly and then spoke again, “I love you, sometimes it amazes me how much.”

Greg had his hand raised to knock on the door of 221B before Mycroft caught up and swung him round to return the kiss, so that when Mrs Hudson answered the door it was to find them in a clinch that made her come over all of a flutter,

“Oh, you two! I’d say you’d be scandalising the neighbours, but I doubt if you are, it’s lovely to see two people in love, and after everything. Come in the boys are waiting for you upstairs.”

 

Thursday – 2 weeks before the trial

The CPS brief had arranged to see Greg at New Scotland Yard for their first meeting. Greg had been quiet all week, and Mycroft didn’t know whether Greg himself even knew how nervous he was about the whole thing. The meeting had been scheduled for 4.30 and the plan was that Greg would finish work afterwards. The two of them had made no plans but Mycroft had arranged his day so that he could surprise Greg. He was hoping that Greg would feel like a meal somewhere but he accepted that it was more likely that Greg would be tired and just want to go home. So he was loitering outside, trying to be patient, trying not to worry and overruling the desire to pace moment by moment.

A couple of times member of The Met approached him to enquire what he was doing watching the building so carefully. Usually Mycroft would have just explained, but this afternoon he had found that his impatience extended to not wanting to be bothered with conversation with anyone but Greg and he had merely flashed his ID at them and taken a minute degree of delight in the way they had scuttled away. 

Still, it was 6.30 and Mycroft was beginning to be convinced that Greg must have left by some other exit and was probably at home by now wondering where Mycroft was. He was just about to go home when Greg did come out of the building. Mycroft took a moment to watch him, knowing that Greg hadn’t seen him. He looked tired, but then it was Friday afternoon, but there was a slump to his shoulders that was from more than tiredness. It looked to Mycroft like the meeting had been a draining one. Which of course was why he was here. Glancing at the traffic he hurried across the road and called,

“Greg!”

Greg turned, his eyebrows raised, ready to respond to whomever had called his name with what Mycroft mentally termed ‘friendly discouragement’. When he saw that it had been Mycroft who called, Greg’s shoulders slumped even more for a second but Mycroft could see that it was more a reaction of relief and perhaps relaxation than anything else. He hurried forward,

“I thought I’d meet you here,” Mycroft said, “so that if you wanted to get something to eat we could.” Mycroft was aware that he was blathering, but the genuine smile he got from Greg made him feel better. Greg leaned towards him and Mycroft gave him a hug, “Was it bloody?” he asked. 

Greg pulled away slightly and Mycroft released him. Greg fidgeted with his cuffs for a second before he replied,

“No worse than I expected,” he said with an unconvincing attempt at nonchalance but he seemed to realise that he wasn’t likely to fool Mycroft and continued in a quieter voice, “pretty much.”

“I’m sorry,” Mycroft said,

“Don’t be. These guys are on my side. They’re meant to make it tough so that I’m prepared. It just makes the whole trial thing that bit more ‘real’ I guess.” He took a deep breath and then continued, “They still reckon about a week, so whatever happens, within a month we’ll be on the other side of this damn thing, finally. I just need to keep my mind focused on that, in just four week it will all be finished.”

“Four weeks,” Mycroft mused, and it occurred to him that the two of them could book a holiday. He was about to suggest this when Greg interrupted him,

“No, I don’t think we should arrange something for then,” he managed a genuine smile at Mycroft’s reaction to having his thoughts so easily read, “Sod’s Law would be sure to mean that something would happen, some adjournment, some delay, we can always pick up something later when we’re both feeling better.”

“Actually, do you need to be there after you’ve given evidence? Do you want to be there?”

Greg answered from the Police point of view, like this was any other case,

“No, there’s no need for me to attend other than to give evidence,” he ran out of words and it was clear to Mycroft that Greg was yet again running full tilt into the difference between detective and victim, “I’m not sure,” he continued, “I think I probably do want to be there.” There was a long pause before Greg spoke again, “You know everyone keeps warning me that they might not get a conviction like I don’t know the statistics already, but I think I want to see the whole thing through so that if it doesn’t happen I might be able to pinpoint the issue.” Again he stopped speaking and after a moment Mycroft continued for him,

“So that you know it wasn’t you?”

“Or so that if it is me I do know, more likely.” He glanced up at Mycroft and must have been able to again gather some of his thoughts from his expression. He spoke hurriedly, “No, sorry, it’s not anything like I’m thinking it’s my fault, I know it isn’t, but, witnesses do and say things every day that just plant some sort of seed of doubt in the jury’s mind. I know it doesn’t make any sense but I’d just want to know.”

Mycroft nodded his agreement,

“Are you still sure that you don’t want me in the court when you testify?”

Greg took longer to speak than Mycroft had expected and when he did it wasn’t an answer to that question,

“You know I think we should go and get some food, I certainly don’t feel like cooking and I shouldn’t think you do. How long have you been stood here? You must be freezing!”

Mycroft allowed the change of subject as they turned, heading in the direction of the place they usually ate if Mycroft met Greg after work.

 

Greg had a surprising appetite, Mycroft had more than half expected him to pick at his meal, but he’d ordered a substantial meal and wolfed his starter when it arrived. When those plates had been cleared and Mycroft had poured him a second glass of wine, Greg finally answered the question,

“I don’t mind, you know, you being there, if you want to be, but it’s probably best if you don’t tell me. It’s difficult, I think I’d like the idea of you being there but I don’t want to be distracted from doing the best job I can. My testimony is already so, I don’t know, hit and miss, the only thing that might help is if I’m firm about what I do remember. But knowing you’re close by, that will help.”

“Very well,” Mycroft agreed as the waiter approached with Greg’s steak, “I won’t tell you.”

The two of them busied themselves with their food for a moment but Greg didn’t really start eating and Mycroft looked up to find Greg giving him ‘a look’ which Mycroft returned with the blandest of not quite smiles until Greg broke into a grin,

“No, I don’t suppose that would work would it?”

“Not really, no. If you’re sure you’re all right with it then I will attend all of the trial,” he paused for a moment, taking a sip of his wine and then continued, “What you said about wanting to know what had gone wrong if it did go wrong? I understand that, and I suppose if I’m there, I can watch the bit that you can’t watch.”

It was Greg’s turn to fidget, precisely repositioning his cutlery for a moment before he replied,

“And will you do that, honestly?”

“If by that you mean will I tell you what I think about your testimony, then yes, I will do that as honestly as I can.”

“Even if what you have to say is ‘you made a right balls up of that, you burke,’?”

“Even then, although I might not use quite the same language,” Mycroft answered with a smile.

“Thanks,” Greg’s voice was suddenly thick and Mycroft wondered for a second what he’d said that had upset him, but then Greg continued to speak, “Oh, don’t look like that, you haven’t upset me, I want your honesty, it just suddenly struck me how lucky I am to have someone who’d do that for me, who I could trust to do that for me.”

Mycroft felt somewhat taken aback by that and unusually floundered for something to say a little, before he cleared his throat and spoke,

“I’d say ‘anytime’ but,” he picked up his wine, “here’s to never having to do it but this once!”

Greg picked his glass up and gently touched Mycroft’s before he began to speak about more general things and they both began to eat.

 

Thursday night – one day before the trial

Mycroft wasn’t entirely sure what he’d expected Greg to be like the night before the trial, all nervous energy, perhaps or possibly quiet and withdrawn. He was sure, however, that Greg behaving as though tomorrow was just another day was somehow making him more and more nervous. _It’s like waiting for the fuse to burn down_ , Mycroft thought, _and I don’t even know if there is a fuse, he could just, actually, be this calm about it all, after all he’s been to court a hundred times_. 

In the end Greg noticed Mycroft’s nerves or at least decided to comment on them,

Mycroft was occupied with a book, theoretically reading but really just staring and thinking when Greg suddenly spoke,

“Try not to worry about it,” he said, “It’ll be fine.”

Mycroft contemplated denying that he was worrying, concerned that it might look like a lack of confidence in Greg, but he quickly decided not to and instead asked the question that had been playing over and over in his mind,

“How can you be so calm about it?”

Greg seemed to think about the question for a moment and then replied,

“I’m not, really, but I’ve had to train myself not to worry about court over the years and I’m trying to apply the same to this. It’s not working that well.” He finished with a small smile.

“I don’t suppose I’m helping much,” Mycroft replied and he would have continued, but Greg interrupted him,

“You always help. Knowing that it’s not just me, well, it is helpful even if it does make getting my mind off the thing that bit more difficult.”

Mycroft thought for a moment putting down his book before he spoke,

“There are all sorts of distracting things we could do,” he suggested. He was relieved when Greg responded with a smile,

“I can’t say that hadn’t occurred to me, but would it be OK if we just went to bed? Neither of us is going to get anything done tonight after all.”

“I think that sounds like an admirable idea,” Mycroft said, getting up and holding out his hand to help Greg up, “come on then, love, it’s not exactly like Christmas but sooner it’s tomorrow, the sooner it’s nearly all over.”

Greg accepted the proffered hand and once he was on his feet he pulled Mycroft into a hug before he replied,

“You’re right, I just need to hang on to that, whatever happens it will all soon be over.”


	14. Chapter 14

“I affirm that the evidence I will give will be the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth.”

Mycroft was pleased that he couldn’t hear so much as a tremor in Greg’s voice as he took the oath before giving his evidence. This first morning there shouldn’t be anything that was a surprise, the questions Greg was going to be asked by the CPS brief had been rehearsed and fine tuned to the nth degree, Greg knew what he was going to say, it was still excruciatingly nerve making; it was a thing that Mycroft couldn’t make better for him not with all his influence. It was a thing that Mycroft would have to endure, and endure whilst knowing that it was obviously far worse for Greg.

After what Greg had said about him being there while he gave evidence the two of them had set off separately from the flat. Greg hadn’t asked him whether he was coming to the court and true to his word Mycroft had not volunteered the information, even though both of them knew that short of nuclear strike he would be there. Just at the moment, however, Mycroft was sure he should have taken Greg at his original word and just gone to work that morning because try as he might his thoughts were constantly straying to the three men in the dock.

They looked small. They were small. Small and scared and Mycroft wanted to kill them. Homicidal thoughts were not Mycroft’s usual thing, they were a waste of time and effort. Briefly he replayed the conversation he’d had with Greg in the early days of this whole thing, the conversation about having people ‘disappeared’. He had done it, when it was necessary, as he’d explained to Greg, but that was the worst he’d done; his country had no death penalty and he was glad of it. At least he was glad of it almost all of the time; this morning he would happily have seen it back on the statute book for these men.

Resolutely he turned his attention back to what Greg was saying, what the CPS barrister was asking. Greg still seemed to be coping admirably, not rushing to answer and not hesitating. Their strategy was such that Greg was being very clear about what he did and didn’t remember, there would be no points at which the defence could challenge what he remembered, the only things that the barrister was asking him about were before and after the attack, before the drug and after it wore off. To any other questions Greg would truthfully answer, ‘I don’t remember,’ and their expert witness as to the effect of the drug would make it clear at a later date that the drugs that Greg had been given would have had an effect on his memory.

Then would come the part that Mycroft was not sure he could deal with, the part where the defence barrister would try to give the jury the idea that Greg was either an unreliable and hysterical witness on whose word no reliance could be placed or that he was a promiscuous liar trying to cover up his infidelity. They had talked long and hard about that part of the likely defence. It hinged on their relationship, was it reason enough, was it monogamous enough for Greg to lie to cover up the fact that he’d given into the base instincts that everyone knew that homosexuals had and picked up three innocent blokes just for a four-way in a dirty, disgusting alley before turning on them and making out that they had forced him. Mycroft knew that saying it didn’t make it true, but it was so horribly close to what he’d thought.

The CPS barrister was reaching the end of the questions which Greg had told him about. The cross-examination would happen next but if Mycroft was any judge that would be after an adjournment for lunch.

“I have no further questions for the witness,” the barrister concluded and sure enough the judge looked at his watch,

“I think, given the time that it would be better for the cross-examination to take place after lunch, court is adjourned.” Mycroft looked at the defence barrister who was obviously not particularly happy at the timing. Someone spoke, right by Mycroft’s ear and he was sufficiently surprised that he actually jumped. He looked round to see his brother and Doctor Watson, but before he could speak Sherlock continued,

“I said, their barrister probably wanted to start before lunch, it would have given him two chances to create doubt in the mind of the jury.”

“That was my assessment of the situation, he would hope that by effectively telling them the same thing twice it would be that bit more likely to sway them.”

Sherlock didn’t continue with that line of conversation, instead, as usual he cut right to the issues that Mycroft would have rather he left alone,

“You were surprised to see me. You should have expected that many of Lestrade’s friends would be here.”

“It wasn’t that I wasn’t expecting you, more that I was focussed on what was going forward.”

“Yes,” Sherlock replied, “that and what the defence are going to say about Lestrade later.” He paused for a moment and then almost visibly shook himself out of his thoughts, “I’m going to take you to lunch, no don’t argue, you and Lestrade are still pretending that you might not be here and John has gone to take him away from all this for an hour, so you’re stuck with me, I’m afraid.”

Mycroft was amazed at how close to tears his brother’s consideration had brought him, again his brother could read what he was thinking,

“It’s not a time for you to sit and stew on your own, come on.”

 

Showing unheard of tact, Sherlock had almost made small talk (really very small talk indeed, in any other circumstances Mycroft would have found it amusing) during the break, as they toyed with their bar meal, only at the end did they turn back to the trial.

“Are you expecting them to try and make out that Lestrade went willingly with them?”

“Yes, that’s the most likely defence.” Mycroft cleared his throat and continued, “To some extent the forensic evidence forces them into that approach.”

“A double edged sword,” Sherlock said with an abstracted air before he sat up straighter, “Shall we get back?” he asked and Mycroft nodded his agreement. Standing up Mycroft realised that he shouldn’t have eaten,

“Excuse me,” he said and struggled his way through to the toilets.

Sherlock was waiting outside when Mycroft had rid himself of his lunch and Mycroft felt a moment of annoyance at being seen in this state, but it was only a moment, and he managed to at least attempt a smile, “Sorry for that interruption, you’re right we should get back.”

Sherlock didn’t reply as they walked back to the court room.

 

Mycroft managed to get home before Greg that evening. Greg had likely stayed to talk to his brief and to discuss what if anything he should be saying or doing differently when the defence continued their cross-examination in the morning. It had been as bloody as he had been expecting, with insinuations about Greg’s behaviour and times when he was out and out accused of lying. To the casual observer it might seem that Greg was unmoved by these attacks, but to Mycroft’s more experienced eye the distress caused was obvious.

Mycroft wanted to be by the door, waiting to hold Greg when he came in, he wanted to be able to make it all better and he knew he couldn’t, didn’t have a hope. He didn’t even know if Greg would want to keep the pretence that he hadn’t gone to court. He began to put together a light meal, knowing as he did it that Greg would be unlikely to want to eat.

Just when he was beginning to worry he heard the door. For a second he was immobile, completely unsure as to what to do, what might make things worse before he realised that anything he might do or not do tonight would make it worse and went into the hall.

Greg was leaning against the door with his eyes shut, looking like he was glad beyond measure to have shut the world out. Mycroft paused, assessing what state Greg was in, until Greg opened his eyes,

“Well, that was bloody,” he said simply with a brave attempt at a smile.

“About what you were expecting?” Mycroft asked as Greg pushed himself away from the door,

“Well, certainly about what the CPS guy was expecting, on some levels I don’t think I believed him.”

“Do you want to talk about it?” Mycroft asked,

“Not right at the moment, thanks,”

“Well then, get changed I’ve done some food.”

Mycroft knew that it was on the tip of Greg’s tongue to reject the idea of food but Greg smiled and said thanks and disappeared into the bedroom as Mycroft went back to stir and fret.

 

Greg ate more than Mycroft expected, which is to say he ate something, picking at the thick soup and crumbling more of the bread than he ate, but he was at least trying. They had talked about nothing, things in the news, nothing that mattered. Mycroft had poured Greg some wine and he had sipped at it, Mycroft couldn’t decide whether that was a good, bad or indifferent sign or whether none of it meant anything at all. He was just going to get up and clear away when Greg spoke,

“I wouldn’t report it if it happened again. Is that terrible when I’d encourage a member of the public to report it?”

“No,” Mycroft replied straight away, “not terrible, understandable. No one would want to go through what you went through today.”

“Well, no, obviously not,” he stopped speaking and Mycroft waited trying by the power of thought to convey both his readiness to listen if Greg wanted to continue and the fact that he was not demanding that he did. In the end Greg did continue, “I don’t remember the actual rape, but I won’t ever be able to forget the case. I feel like I should be able to take the drugs again and erase it all,” he sighed, “it doesn’t seem fair.”

It was such an amazing understatement that Mycroft almost laughed,

“No, it really doesn’t.” he agreed and continued to wait until Greg spoke again,

“Do you think I did something awful in a previous life,” he asked with the same attempt at a smile that he’d given Mycroft earlier. Mycroft smiled back though it felt more than peculiar,

“I doubt it. Do you believe in past lives?” Greg shrugged and Mycroft thought it was possibly because he wasn’t sure if Mycroft was going to take things seriously. Mycroft swallowed and continued, “If there are past lives I’d like to believe that through all those lives you and I have always been together, always held each other up, always completed the other. I don’t believe you did something awful in a previous life because no version of you would do something that bad that this was the payback.”

Greg smiled faintly,

“Oh, I don’t know about that.”

“I do,” Mycroft said.

“So we were in ancient Egypt?” Greg asked with a better attempt at a smile,

“With my complexion?” Mycroft asked, his face showing how aghast he was at the idea, “No, I think we were woad covered Britons fighting the invading Roman Legions!”

“No,” Greg disagreed, “I was an ancient Briton, you were the Roman general who persuaded me of the benefits of civitatis Romanum, and converted me to a client.”

Mycroft was surprised at Greg’s knowledge of Roman colonisation techniques and Greg could apparently read that surprise,

“You see, you’re not the only one with a knowledge of ancient civilisations.”

“It would seem not,” Mycroft agreed, inviting Greg to continue with a raised eyebrow, smiling more widely as he saw a faint blush spread over Greg’s face,

“I did a school project,” Greg said, “really none of the schools I went to were likely to do classics, where they?”

“And you’ve remembered it all this time?”

“Some things just sick, don’t they. And then I did some reading.” The smile faded from his face and was replaced with an intense expression, “Do you fancy teaching this ancient Briton some of your fancy continental ways?”

Mycroft was surprised and very, very careful not to let it show, if this was what Greg wanted, it was certainly what he wanted,

“I don’t know, we Romans have some pretty sophisticated ideas, we got them from our Greek teachers,” 

“Those were precisely the ideas I had in mind.”

 

Greg had been … energetic was the word, and Mycroft was more than happy for both of them to drift off to sleep, but after a little while Greg spoke,

“Does it matter?” he asked.

“Does what matter?” Mycroft asked, genuinely not sure what Greg meant,

“Does it matter what the up-shot of the trial is?”

Mycroft genuinely didn’t know what to say and after a moment Greg realised this and continued,

“Guilty or not guilty, it hasn’t changed anything has it. We’re still here, we still have each other.”

“No,” Mycroft answered, slowly, “it won’t make much difference to us. They haven’t taken anything from us. It’s a terrible cliché but we’re probably stronger.”

Greg grinned a little,

“Right after it happened, I spent a lot of time waiting for someone to say ‘What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger,’ so that I could have the considerable pleasure of beating them to a bloody pulp and then asking them how strong they felt,” he paused for a second and then looked up and took in Mycroft’s expression, “Not you, you daft sod and not now. You’re right, we’ve had to fight for this now, it was all,” he paused and grimaced, searching for the right word Mycroft thought, “easy, we met and we clicked and we didn’t have to deal with family, well apart from Sherlock, it was easy. Now we know we can get through difficult times and that we’re prepared to deal with problems and come through them.” He stopped speaking and snuggled closer to Mycroft who wondered for a moment if he could die from feeling so content. Mycroft tightened his grip on him and Greg spoke again, “So it doesn’t matter, just like it doesn’t matter what they say about me in court. It will be what it will be and you can be damn sure that half of the Met will be on their case from here on in if they do get off.”

“No, it doesn’t matter,” Mycroft replied and he almost meant it. It did matter to him what people said of Greg, but he understood the intent and allowed himself to be happy that Greg had found a way to live with it either way, not that he was kidding himself that it would be quite that easy.

 

Mycroft got up and got ready the same way he had the day before, intending to go to the court separately as he had before. Greg was tense and they didn’t chat much over the little breakfast they managed but when Mycroft was on the point of leaving, Greg spoke up,

“There’s no point messing about, we both know you’re going to the court, we might as well go together.”

“If you’re sure?” Mycroft asked,

“Of course I’m sure. My bit of it should be all over today, even that arsehole can’t keep finding different ways to ask the same question, can he.”

“Not, I would hope, without the judge stopping him. Is there much more testimony than yours?”

“Not from the CPS, a fair bit of expert testimony but that’s all fairly straightforward since they aren’t trying to say they weren’t there or we got the wrong men, we don’t know what sort of ‘character’ witnesses their brief might put forward, though.”

“It’s hard to imagine how that would work,” Mycroft mused, “perhaps a succession of their relatives and friends to say ‘well he never drugged and raped me’?”

“Something like that, I guess. Come on, let’s go.”

 

When they got out of the taxi (Mycroft had insisted, Greg hadn’t argued much and it hadn’t saved them more than about five minutes), Mycroft was confronted with the real problem of travelling together, the fact that they would have to go their separate ways now. They ended up stood in front of the steps of the courts with nothing more to say than ‘Well, er, well,’. It was Greg who finally broke,

“Well, aren’t we the articulate ones this morning?” he said with a grin, “I’d ask you to give me a kiss,”

“But?” Mycroft interrupted and then reached for Greg and kissed him quickly and passionately.

“But nothing,” Greg replied, “At least something’s gone right this morning. Listen, I’ll come and find you in the gallery once they’ve done with me, you don’t mind staying for the rest of it? You might get a bit more notice, so I’ll understand if you don’t want to or you don’t want me to.”

“As if I wouldn’t stay,” Mycroft replied with a small smile, “I’ll see you later.”

 

John and Sherlock were at the court again. Mycroft saw them as soon as he went into the building. He knew they would want to know how Greg was and whilst he could have avoided them he knew it was only fair to answer their questions, if Sherlock couldn’t just ‘read’ the answers he wanted.

“How is he this morning?” John asked,

“Better, I think, than yesterday. We had a long talk, and reached the conclusion that it didn’t matter what happened, that seemed to make him feel a bit better.”

“It doesn’t matter?” Sherlock asked,

“In the sense that he’s done the right thing, that we’ve all done the right thing. Greg’s made his peace with it,” he paused for a long time, trying to find a form of words that wasn’t too abject, “Please don’t do anything that will make him question that peace,” Mycroft closed his eyes, rubbing at the bridge of his nose, “I don’t doubt it will come soon enough, anyway.”

“Yeah,” John agreed, “but he’ll keep getting back to this stage and it’ll be easier every time.” 

“You think?” Sherlock asked, the question more directed at John than himself Mycroft realised,

“I know,” he replied, “he has done the right thing and keeping that in mind will get easier and easier for him.

 

The rest of Greg’s cross-examination was the same as the start had been, innuendo and supposition, many objections and an increasingly irritated judge. Mycroft was not sure that it was a good move on the part of the defence team, but he was not going to argue with them making themselves obnoxious to both the jury and the person who would with a bit of luck be deciding the sentence.

It took some time after Greg was released from the witness box for him to get to the gallery. Mycroft had successfully kept a seat for him by dint of freezing out anyone who looked like they might sit down there. As Greg moved towards him he attracted some attention, which was to be expected, Mycroft thought, but the rules of the court kept the disturbance down to a minimum. Greg had taken his tie off and looked like fifteen years had been taken off him. Mycroft was surprised at how relieved he was by that. As Greg sat down he reached across to squeeze his hand and somehow forgot to let go.

The prosecution was currently questioning an expert forensics witness. It was pretty much routine, there were hardly likely to be any surprises. That said it was fairly probing, going into how the evidence had been collected and by whom. Mycroft found himself concerned by the fact that it had been Greg who’d collected a reference sample from him, worried that it could be parlayed into reasonable doubt, but he was careful to ensure that he just looked interested and focused.

The questions moved on to the matches that had been made and the probability of a match if the two samples hadn’t come from the same person. Greg leaned towards him and whispered,

“It used to be that forensics made the case for you, probably more than it should have, now juries think they know about it and it can go right against a case.”

Mycroft squeezed his hand and they both continued to listen to the questions and answers that were going forward. The prosecution finished with the witness and as she was squaring her shoulders ready for the defence’s questions the judge announced that they would adjourn for lunch. Mycroft was surprised at the large number of breaks and the shortness of the sessions, but then he supposed the jury had to maintain their concentration. He looked round at Greg,

“Do you want to get some lunch?”

Greg didn’t answer straight away, he was clearly trying to reach some sort of conclusion and he was clearly nervous about what he said next,

“How long are they not expecting you at work?”

“I haven’t said a particular time, they know they can contact me outside court hours, but they aren’t expecting me at a specific time. Why?”

“Well, you don’t have to say yes to this, but let’s go away somewhere, just for a day or two. Like we said it doesn’t matter what happens and I really, badly don’t want to spend any more time and energy on those arseholes, what do you think?”

Mycroft thought that it sounded like a fine idea but before he could answer the question, Sherlock, who had approached without Mycroft noticing, butted in,

“That’s an excellent idea. Mummy’s in the south of France, you could go down to the house for a couple of days.”

Mycroft opened his mouth to speak again but this time it was John who interrupted,

“I’ll let you know what happens here.”

Finally Mycroft managed to speak, a little plaintively,

“I was always going to say yes, we only need to pack some clothes and we can be gone. Thank you John and of course you, Sherlock.”

“Not too many clothes,” Greg replied with an unmistakeable leer.

 

On their third morning at the house Mycroft was up early. What he was doing could best be described as pottering about, not a thing he was very used to doing but he rather thought that he could get used to getting up and making a leisurely breakfast before going back to bed with Greg. The toast popped up and he gingerly picked it up and put it in the toast rack so that it wouldn’t cool soggily, Greg had a thing about toast that was almost cold and dried out, especially with strawberry jam. Making sure everything was in place Mycroft lifted the tray and backed out of the kitchen to take it back to his, their bedroom.

Greg was awake and sat up when he opened the door,

“I could get used to this,” he said with a smile. Mycroft grinned back, amused and warmed by the way they were both thinking the same thing,

“So could I.”

They both busied themselves about breakfast with a little bit of feeding each other things for good measure. When they’d finished Mycroft moved the tray and then climbed back into bed. Greg turned towards him, pulled him close and kissed him.

When they broke apart, breathless Mycroft spoke,

“That’s also something that I find gets better the more I get used to it.” He leaned in and kissed Greg again, but after a moment he found himself gently pushed away,

“We can’t stay in bed for the rest of time,” Greg said with a smile,

“Not sure why not,” Mycroft said with a deliberate pout,

“Because we will get bed sores and our limbs will wither,”

“Not with the amount of ‘exercise’ we’ve been getting.”

“All right then, we’ll get sores in other places, or possibly callouses which would be worse.”

“You may have a point,” Mycroft grudgingly agreed, “what do you want to do instead.”

“Show me over the grounds?”

“Ah, you want to see the rolling acres?”

“Yeah, we can build up an … appetite!”

 

Mycroft’s phone rang as they were climbing to the top of the hill behind the Home Wood. He looked to Greg, worried that he would be annoyed but from the look on his face he fully realised why Mycroft needed to be contactable. Mycroft looked at the caller ID. It was Sherlock and Mycroft knew that it could only be one thing he was ringing about. As he answered it Greg moved slightly away, far enough that he wouldn’t be able to hear the other end of the conversation at least,

“Hello,”

“Mycroft, it’s over.”

Mycroft waited for Sherlock to continue becoming more and more certain that it must be bad news. He was on the point of asking when he heard John’s voice from a distance from the phone,

“Oh, for pity’s sake, Sherlock, put him out of his misery!”

“Oh! Yes, sorry, all guilty, I thought you’d know that’s what I meant! The defence case fell apart when they questioned the little one, Madder was he called? Jury was out for less than an hour.”

Mycroft felt the world sway around him but he kept his voice low and calm,

“Sentences?”

“Adjourned for later sentencing, but currently remanded in custody. The judge said the sentences were likely to be lengthy.”

“Thank you so much for calling. We’ll probably be round to see you in a day or two when we’re back. Thank you, Sherlock and thank John for me, anything you’ve ever owed me was paid back in the help you gave Lestrade back at the start of this,” trying to get control over his voice, “Just … thank you.”

He hung up, not wanting to hear Sherlock’s reaction to what he had just said and turned back towards Greg who was looking enquiringly at him,

“Do we need to go back?” he asked a small smile making it clear that he wasn’t going to get mad about it if that were the case,

“No, not at the moment. That was Sherlock,” for a second or two it was hard to actually get the words out and Mycroft knew how Sherlock had felt but he pushed on through it, “they were all found guilty, remanded in custody for sentencing later.”

Mycroft didn’t know what he expected Greg’s reaction to be. He hadn’t expected that Greg would freeze, perfectly expressionless and stare at him. Mycroft waited, determined to give Greg the time he needed, but as the seconds ticked by he became more and more nervous, he truly had no idea what Greg’s reaction was going to be.

“Jury can’t have been out for long,”

That comment didn’t even make it onto Mycroft’s long list of what Greg might say but he quickly responded,

“Less than an hour, Sherlock said,”

“So it was him who rang?” Greg asked, more Mycroft thought to be saying something than to actually be asking that question,

“Yes, he and John stayed to the end of the thing.”

“I suppose that once Madder gave up his mates,” Greg stopped speaking and ended up staring into space, looking almost more forlorn than he had right back when it happened. He was beginning to worry Mycroft. 

“I think the case would have succeeded without him, but yes, that’s probably why the jury were back quite so soon.” He stopped speaking, tension building, wanting desperately to ask Greg how he was feeling, “should we go back to the house?” he asked,

“What? Er, yes, if you want to.” Greg still sounded like he’d been concussed, and Mycroft decided that yes, going back to the house seemed like a good idea, if Greg was going to go catatonic on him, he ought at least to do it where Mycroft could easily summon help. He moved closer to Greg and took his arm, trying to make it seem companionable, and set off at a considered pace back down the hill to the house.

 

By the time they got back to the house, Greg had regained some of his colour but apparently none of his desire to talk,

“I’m going to … go upstairs. Sorry.”

Mycroft stood in the hall and watched him walk slowly up the stairs without a backward glance, wondering what was going to happen. After a few moment she recollected himself and went into the kitchen.

Ten minutes later he was reflecting on how very English he really was, as he sipped at his too hot cup of tea. _What next?_ he wondered, _what happens next? Is it possible in Greg’s mind I’m too connected to what happened, that he will want to be shot of me?_ He shook his head as if someone had actually said the words out loud. _No, I have to hold to the commitment we made all those weeks ago, to the fact that we would find a way back. It’s useless to worry about it, that’s for sure._ With that he got up and went into the library and picked a book almost at random. It was one of his mother’s favoured regency romances, and not for the first time he wondered why she liked them, not because they were badly written but because she was so much more like one of the unpleasant characters than she was like the heroine.

 

He was a good third of the way through the book when Greg walked into the library,

“You didn’t need to skulk in here,” Greg said.

Mycroft put his finger between the pages and looked at Greg properly, he looked better, more himself and that alone cheered him,

“It seemed like you probably wanted some time, was I wrong?”

“No, as usual you were right, budge up.”

Mycroft did as he was asked, moving up to the side of the sofa to leave room for Greg who sat down straight away. It took him a while to start speaking and when he did his tone was quiet and reserved,

“I expected to feel different. I thought that even though I’d said it didn’t matter what happened, I would feel different once they were convicted, but I was right, it didn’t matter. They don’t matter. I suppose I feel free, but it’s a weird, weird feeling.”

Mycroft paused, not sure whether Greg was going to speak again, when he didn’t Mycroft spoke,

“They never mattered. And I’m glad you feel this way about them. They don’t matter in the slightest. You matter, we matter, they don’t.”

“Yes,” Greg said, a little hesitantly, “that’s the conclusion I came to myself. We matter, the two of us being together, that’s what matters. Will you marry me?”

Mycroft almost missed it. There was no fanfare and after a moment he realised that was as it should be,

“Yes, I’d be honoured.” Greg sighed with unmistakeable relief and Mycroft smiled, “You can’t seriously have thought I was going to say ‘no’, can you?”

“No, not really but, it’s just neither of us has the best examples of marriage to go off, you might have really hated the idea.”

Mycroft bodily hauled Greg half onto his lap and kissed him. When he finally broke away, when both of them were thoroughly breathless Mycroft answered him,

“We’re not them. We won’t make their mistakes because this is too important to us. We nearly lost everything that night.”

“Yeah,” Greg agreed and Mycroft could see moisture making his eyes shine, “we nearly lost it all and now we’ve found everything.”


End file.
